Financial News on Africa

Nigeria is becoming one of the biggest countries in the world. It will help lift all of the economies of Africa. Wikipedia: Africa

• Automobiles made in Zhōngguó, long a rarity in South Africa, now outsell some brands of vehicles from Europe, the USA and Nihon - now with 15% of the car market in South Africa
  - Comcast's CNBC, 18 October 2025

• A single aviation market in Africa could be a multi-billion dollar opportunity. Now to fly between cities in Africa, you have to fly through Europe or the Middle East - no direct connections. With a single aviation market, airlines can operate any route within Africa, and removes restrictions on operations like pricing and frequency, provided airports have slots available.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 17 October 2025

• Frustrated Gen Z threatens to topple governments in Africa. Protesters say their anger reflects a lack of economic opportunity in Africa with the world's youngest population.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 October 2025

• The military of Christian Madagascar seizes power, and the nation explodes in joy. The change in power came after Parliament voted to impeach President Andry Rajoelina, who faced mounting pressure after weeks of Gen Z protests. Madagascar had been roiled by protests for weeks over the government's failure to provide basic needs, including reliable water and electricity. "He [the former president] s the reason for the corruption. He is the reason for jobless people."
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 October 2025

• Gulf nations are investing billions of dollars in real estate projects along the North Coast of Egypt (west of Alexandria)
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 16 October 2025

• Africa is home to 16 of the world's 20 fastest growing populations
  - Zero Hedge, 14 October 2025

• The continent of Africa is so large that you could fit all of the USA, Zhōngguó, Bharat, and much of the Middle East and Europe - with room to spare. Yet Western, Mercator-based maps don't show this size, marginalizing Africa.
  - Zero Hedge, 13 October 2025

• Africa has "unlimited" solar power potential. Off-grid power could help light up the continent.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 10 October 2025

• "I did not feel safe. I did not feel seen." - why a music star in Nigeria, Tems (Temilade Openiyi) is clearing a path in the music industry for women from Africa
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 06 October 2025

• Two mining firms from Zhōngguó (Sino-Metals Leach Zambia and NFC Africa Mining) are sued over toxic acid spills in Zambia, posing a dilemma for the government of Zambia. A damages compensation lawsuit seeking $80 billion leaves the government of Nambia trying to balance good relations with Zhōngguó, with the needs of local communities. The lawsuit alleges that a tailings dam wall collapse in February released acidic waste into streams, rivers and farms near the town of Kitwe, about 285km (180 miles) north of the capital Lusaka.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 October 2025

• Egypt on Friday blamed Ethiopia for the rising waters in the Nile River and flooding this week in two of its northernmost provinces, claiming the unusually high water levels are due to Ethiopia's mismanagement of its new controversial dam on the Nile.
  - Associated Press, 03 October 2025

• Namibia's indigenous Nama population argues they have been sidelined in a $10 billion renewable energy project being built on their ancestral lands to generate hydrogen using wind and solar energy. The controversy is pitting clean-energy executives from Deutschland against descendants of victim's of Deutschland's forgotten genocide.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 03 October 2025

• China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation, the state-owned construction giant in China that built the Mao Zedong-era Tanzania-Zambia railway is returning to the project with a US$1.4 billion commitment to overhaul and run the line as it increasingly becomes geoeconomically important for China. The railroad line provides crucial rapid transport of copper and cobalt from Zambia to a port in Tanzania.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 01 October 2025

• How traditional medicine techniques and drugs from Zhōngguó are expanding the 'soft' political power of Zhōngguó in Africa - from Tunisia to Chad
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 28 September 2025

• Why the largest untapped deepwater oil field in Africa, TotalEnergies' Venus project in Namibia's Orange Basin, has yet to produce oil
  - Zero Hedge, 26 September 2025

• Three nations in West Africa to leave the International Criminal Court. The military rulers of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger said the court had become a tool of neocolonial repression. All three governments have been accused of human rights violations.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 25 September 2025

• Trump brags about arranging a peace deal between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. It didn't acheive any peace. The scores of militia groups that have fought for three decades in one of the most protracted and complex conflicts in the world are still engaging in deadly fighting. The rebels groups AFC and M23 in Congo, backed by Rwanda, still seek to overthrow the government of Congo. [Another Trump "thou shalt not" lie to say that peace has been achieved.]
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 22 September 2025

• Civil war in Islamic Sudan: a drone strike on an Islamic mosque in the Darfur region of Sudan kills 78 people
  - BBC, 19 September 2025

• The US Trade and Development Agency will invest in a project in Zambia in bid to loosen Zhōngguó's control of critical minerals. The USTDA will provide a US$1.4 million grant to Metalex Africa (a subsidiary of USA-based Metalex Commodities) to fund feasibility study on expanding the copper and cobalt mine.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 19 September 2025

• Fast money is gambling on an accelerating emerging-market trade. The net dollar short versus emerging currencies is approaching 10-year highs.
  - Zero Hedge (locked), 15 September 2025

• The hidden war in Sudan: Muslim Brotherhood's grip on army threatens regional stability, global trade. The Muslim Brotherhood, sponsored by Qatar, appears to be hijacking the SAF to stage a takeover, recycling old alliances under new guises.
  - Zero Hedge, 11 September 2025

• Six countries account for the vast majority of plastic waste in the ocean: Zhōngguó, Philippines, Bharat, Brazil and Indonesia, and Nigeria
  - Zero Hedge, 09 September 2025

• Exports from Zhōngguó to Africa are soaring, as trade to the USA plunges. Already this year, the trade surplus of Zhōngguó with Africa is nearly as big as all of 2024, a sign of how Trump's taxes/tariffs are reshaping the flow of goods to the detriment of the USA.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 September 2025

• The government of Christian Kenya is using antiterrorism courts funded by the Christian USA to suppress political dissent (which is not terrorism). Young people who took to the streets to protest corruption and poor job prospects could face decades in maximum-security prison under a set of laws set up to combat al Qaeda.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 09 September 2025

• This is the world's biggest animal and few outsiders have seen it. Six million antelope storm through a pocket of Africa that is nearly impossible to get to, but the Journal caught them on camera. "The entire planet should be amazed that this exists."
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 08 September 2025

• After outfoxing Egypt on the diplomatic stage for more than a decade, Ethiopia is set to officially inaugurate one of the world's biggest dams (the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam) on a tributary of the River Nile, burying a colonial-era treaty that saw the Christian UK guarantee Egypt 80% of the waters of the Nile. The vast majority of the $5 billion dam was funded by Ethiopia and its people.
  - BBC, 06 September 2025

• BRICS and SCO are gradually rebalancing world power. What brings SCO and BRICS countries together, and there is a growing overlap between them (both in terms of members and partners), is their shared goal of breaking the [much white, racist, Christian] West's de facto monopoly over global governance and power, so that everything becomes fairer for the World Majority, which is much less white and much less Christian.
  - Zero Hedge, 04 September 2025

• He jokes about Trump, and about invading Kenya - and may be the next president of Uganda. The 'good' Christian Muhoozi Kainerugaba, son of the longtime ruler, oversees a key USA military partner while boasting about torture and threatening to arrest members of parliament.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 04 September 2025

• The door to another democracy in Africa is closing, this time in Islamic/Christian Chad
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 September 2025

• Harmony Gold Mining, based in South Africa, reports increased earnings due to higher gold prices, despite lower production of gold
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 29 August 2025

• Overproduction of solar panels in Zhōngguó has led to slashed prices, and countries and buyers in Africa are taking advantage to sharply increase investments in clean energy
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 27 August 2025

• Africa is buying a record-high number of solar panesl from Zhōngguó. Energy-starved countries on the continent have reluctantly turned to coal and gas for decades. Inexpensive solar panels from Zhōngguó are allowing these countries to transition to renewable energy more rapidly.
  - Wired (locked), 21 August 2025

• Trump, send your (non-white) deportees to Europe as part of your racist immigration policies, not to Africa. Deal with immigrants in the USA; failing that, let the former racist colonial Christian powers of Europe bear the burden they helped create in Africa. Rwanda, Eswatini, and South Sudan are among the poorest nations in the world, with per capita incomes just a tiny fraction of their former colonial rulers in Europe. Expecting them to carry the burden of the USA's deportees is not only unjust and racist - it is absurd.
  - Al Jazeera, 20 August 2025

• Famine in Sudan is entering a dangerous new phase. Here is what to know as critical farmlands get dragged into Sudan's devastating Islamic civil war.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 15 August 2025

• The authoritarian Google's YouTube's silencing of journalists in Ethiopia aids authoritarianism
  - The Hill, 12 August 2025

• Countries in Africa have an ambitious plan to establish a 'non-circulating' currency backed by critical minerals. This would allow Africa to reduce its dependence on the USA dollar, and reduce its dependence on loans from the West.
  - Zero Hedge, 10 August 2025

• The white racist Trump's tax/tariff trade war against mostly non-white poor countries in Africa is pushing these countries in Africa into stronger relationships with Zhōngguó. One reason these countries are doing so is that Trump's taxes/tariffs are causing the poor, mostly non-white, nations huge economic losses.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 02 August 2025

• Africa favors Zhōngguó as a partner, as the relationship of Africa with the USA deteriorates due to a disturbing racist pattern by the white racist Trump that "inflicts harm but expects loyalty", as the USA imposes destructive taxes/tariffs on their exports, reduces humanitarian aid and greatly restricts vias for these proud, mostly non-white peoples
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 02 August 2025

• Zhōngguó is investing $350 million in Angola in an effort to boost food security. The deals to grow corn and soybeans involving major state-owned firms come as Beijing seeks to reduce reliance on agricultural supplies from Trump's USA.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 02 August 2025

• Zhōngguó strongly supports the growing space industry in Africa by funding and building a space data receiving ground station in the capital of Namibia
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 02 August 2025

• The white Trump's idiotic war on cacao and chocolate. Taxes/tariffs on imports of cacao are economic idiocy, if to protect American cacao farmers, IF THEY WERE any American cacao farmers to protect. But cacao cannot be grown in the USA. Taxes/tariffs on cacao imports, most from non-White Africa, are just racist and spiteful.
  - Reason, 01 August 2025

• Much like the USA, the billionaire boom in Africa masks a crisis for the vast majority of people in Africa. The surge in African billionaires signals elite capture rather than economic progress, locking millions into poverty. The top 5 percent of Africans now control nearly $4 trillion in wealth, more than double the combined assets of the remaining 95 percent.
  - Al Jazeera, 01 August 2025

• How the threat of Trump's highest tax/tariff of 50% on the African nation of Lesotho wrecked its economy. While Trump eventually imposed only a 15% tax/tariff, the damage was already done. The government has declared a state of disaster due to mass layoffs.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 01 August 2025

• How the threat of Trump's highest tax/tariff of 50% on the African nation of Lesotho wrecked its economy. While Trump eventually imposed only a 15% tax/tariff, the damage was already done. The government has declared a state of disaster due to mass layoffs.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 01 August 2025

• Ethiopia argues that distribution of water from the Nile cannot be governed by colonial-era treaties forced on some countries in Africa (such as Ethiopia) by their former Christian colonial masters. All countries through which the Nile passes should be able to use the waters, not just Egypt and Sudan.
  - Al Jazeera, 28 July 2025

• Ghana is paying for some of the drones being used in Ukraine against Rossiya, as part of its involvement in the emerging regional coalition against Rossiya that plans a long-term campaign against allies of Rossiya in the Sahelian Alliance/Confederation
  - Zero Hedge, 27 July 2025

• A government official in Ethiopia denies Trump's "thou shalt not" lie/claim that the USA funded the River Nile dam. The official said that the dam was entirely funded with monies within Ethiopia. Ethiopia needs the power because 60% of its people have no supply of electricity.
  - BBC, 23 July 2025

• Hershey lifts candy prices, citing high cocoa costs. The chocolate maker has notified retail customers of a double-digit percentage increase, as cocoa markets have stayed high on supply concerns.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 23 July 2025

• Hershey lifts candy prices, citing high cocoa costs. The chocolate maker has notified retail customers of a double-digit percentage increase, as cocoa markets have stayed high on supply concerns.
  - Jiaravanon's Fortune, 23 July 2025

• How pesticides are distrupting the sleep patterns of farmers in Bharat, for example, by suppressing production of melatonin in the body.
  - ZME Science, 22 July 2025

• The nation of South Africa seeks to increase its exports to Zhōngguó to reduce its trade deficit with Zhōngguó, and to compensate for fewer exports to the USA due to Trump's tax/tariff of 30% on imports from South Africa
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 20 July 2025

• France indicates that it is willing to discuss reparations for colonial-era massacres in Niger in the 1890s. Racist, mostly-white, soldiers from France murdered thousands of unarmed people, mostly non-white - typicaly Christian cowardice. Entire villages were destroyed, and all of the people murdered.
  - THe Guardian, 17 July 2025

• "[Africa is] not Truump's dumping ground!" - outrage in the small country of mostly-Black Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) over the forced arrival of mostly non-white illegal immigrants expelled from the USA under the white Trump's racist immigration policies. Outrage in part because the raicst Trump administration labelled these people "depraved monsters" that Trump forced another country to accept. [Much like the USA's racist policies, the Christian USA loves exporting its misery to other countries.]
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 17 July 2025

• "[Africa is] not Truump's dumping ground!" - outrage in the small country of mostly-Black Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) over the forced arrival of mostly non-white illegal immigrants expelled from the USA under the white Trump's racist immigration policies. Outrage in part because the raicst Trump administration labelled these people "depraved monsters" that Trump forced another country to accept. [Much like the USA's racist policies, the Christian USA loves exporting its misery to other countries.]
  - Zero Hedge, 17 July 2025

• What the brutal killing of a female police officer, by her unemployed husband, reveals about the crisis of femicide in mostly-male-dominating-Christian Kenya
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 17 July 2025

• Egypt plans to increase its share of renewable production from 13% in 2023, to 42% by 2030, must of the increase from solar energy production
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 17 July 2025

• Zhōngguó will use economic transactions in Africa as a 'launchpad' for global use of the yuan. Multiple countries in Africa have made deals to consider or use the yuan for trade and financial transactions.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 16 July 2025

• "No more wars involving the USA" Trump allows the DoD (its USA Africa Command) to launch over 50 missile attacks in Somalia in 2025 (with no coverage from mainstream media)
  - Antiwar.com, 15 July 2025

• Damascus, Syria, is the least livable city in the world, followed by cities in other troubled regions of the world. The 6th least livable city is Lagos, the largest city in bNigeria.
  - Zero Hedge, 15 July 2025

• The southern hemisphere is full of birds found nowhere else on Earth. Their importance has been overlooked.
  - Phys.org, 15 July 2025

• The 17th BRICS summit in Rio de Janeiro reaffirmed the BRICS' growing political weight and its desire to become an important force in influencing the emerging multipolar order. It also reaffirmed the desire of the BRICS countries, and others, to reject the dominance of Western (USA, Europe) countries
  - Zero Hedge, 12 July 2025

• The white racist Trump's Africa summit at the White House was a masterclass in modern white Christian racist colonial threater. To dodge the racist Trump's taxes/tariffs and wrath, five African presidents played the role of loyal colonial subject, and left their dignity behind.
  - Al Jazeera, 11 July 2025

• The chocolate industry is facing a new era of chronic shortages and record-high prices across cocoa beans, butter, powder, and paste, sparking structural supply disruptions across North America and Europe. At the heart of the crisis is West Africa, where countries such as Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Nigeria and Cameroon - responsible for 75% of global cocoa production - have been severely impacted by years of adverse weather and crop diseases. Cocoa bean prices have remained above $8000/ton for over one year, being under $2000/thon before 2023.
  - Zero Hedge, 10 July 2025

• The racist Trump compliments the "good English" of the president of Liberia, prompting a wave of criticism across Africa. "I feel that the US president and people in the west still see Africans as people in villages who are not educated."
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 09 July 2025

• The USA and Europe want to obtain more rare earth metals from Africa. But countries in Africa want more than money - they want jobs for their citizens, so they are imposing restrictions on exports of rare earth metals and minerals to develop processing industries in their countries, creating jobs as well as profits.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 09 July 2025

• Trump is hosting an "African leaders" meeting at the White House. But only leaders from 5 countries in Africa have been invited, all small economies, because the bigger countries economically in Africa are aligned with BRICS (the pact that includes Brazil, Zhōngguó and India), and Trump hates BRICS.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 09 July 2025

• The government of South Africa, led by freedom fighters, is now overseeing a police force accused of staggering abuses.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 July 2025

• The 31% tax/tariff that Trump has imposed on imports from South Africa is ruining the $2 billion citrus agricultural industry in South Africa (such as the orange industry). And while Trump pretends to be worried about white farmers in South Africa, these white farmers grow a lot of citrus and thus are being financially hurt by Trump.
  - Bloomberg, 07 July 2025

• The history of the "very special" relationship between Zhōngguó and Tanzania. Their 60-year military partnership is a unique relationship in Africa.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 July 2025

• Brazil, Argentina and Nigeria are producing more and more oil, at a time when OPEC+ is trying to limit global oil production
  - Barron's, 05 July 2025

• Craft brewers in the USA are suffering financially due to Trump's taxes/tariffs on steel and aluminum, and taxes/tariffs on ingredients such as hops from Europe, cocoa from Africa, etc.
  - Cato At Liberty, 03 July 2025

• Young people in South Africa find it harder to buy homes, as foreign buyers have helped increase property prices 160% since 2010
  - Bloomberg, 02 July 2025

• After España imports a record amount of diesel fuel from Morocco, the El Pais newspapers argues that much of the oil originated from Rossiya, in defiance of EU sanctions
  - Zero Hedge, 02 July 2025

• After España imports a record amount of diesel fuel from Morocco, the El Pais newspapers argues that much of the oil originated from Rossiya, in defiance of EU sanctions
  - El Pais, 02 July 2025

• With developing nations crushed by unaffordable borrowing ($8.7 trillion worth of debt), and the USA abandoning much of its foreign aid, leaders of some developing countries are arranging deals for debt forgiveness.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 01 July 2025

• $7,200,000,000 - The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission of Nigeria has arrested two ex-oil officials, including the former chief financial officer of Nigeria's state energy firm NNPC, over an alleged $7.2-billion fraud, corruption, and abuse of office.
  - OilPrice.com, 24 June 2025

• Cheap foreign small-cap stocks offer big gains in a trade war. It pays to have an active manager to navigate this sector. Vanguard's indexed ETF holds 4,794 stocks. Many are illiquid or poorly run, and most have little or even no coverage by Wall Street analysts.
  - Barron's, 21 June 2025

• Niger will nationalize a uranium mine operated by French state-affiliated firm. Niger's nationalization of the Somair mine operated by Orano comes as Niger moves away from France and seeks closer ties with Rossiya.
  - Al Jazeera, 20 June 2025

• The nature of manhood in Africa is broken - and it is costing women their lives. Femicide is surging across Africa. Without cultural reform led by men themselves, more lives of women will be lost. In South Africa, a study reported that the persistence of gender-based violence is rooted in "deeply ingrained societal norms and structures that perpetuate male dominance and reinforce gender hierarchies ... leading to female subordination, systemic inequalities, and violence against women"
  - Al Jazeera, 20 June 2025

• A new frontline emerges as Islamic jihadists expand into the countries of the west coast of Africa. Islamic insurgents are expanding from West Africa's Sahel region toward Atlantic coastal nations such as Ivory Coast, creating new Islamic terrorism hot spots and displacing millions of people.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 June 2025

• Zhōngguó's cross-border payment system spreads across Africa and Asia, amid the USA trade war with the world
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 19 June 2025

• Mali places Barrick Gold's Loulo-Gounkoto mine under state control. The ruling follows months of tensions. In January, Barrick suspended operations after authorities blocked exports over a tax and royalty dispute.
  - Zero Hedge, 17 June 2025

• Black South Africa built a medical research powerhouse. Trump destruction of USA foreign aid has destroyed South Africa's medical research center.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 June 2025

• Without significant socialist subsidies, 'green' hydrogen produced in Africa may be economically unviable for Europe due to high production costs
  - Zero Hedge, 16 June 2025

• Mpox surges in Sierra Leone as health officials appeal for support from the USA. Countries in West Africa re struggling to track and treat infections, and experts warn the outbreak is rapidly spreading, while the USA is destroying global vaccination efforts.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 15 June 2025

• Construction is booming in capital city of Somalia, and as Mogadishu literally rises from the ashes of its violent past, it is also giving unexpected work and business opportunities to women. "With numerous ongoing infrastructure, energy, and technology projects, the workload has significantly increased. As a result, the association actively encourages greater participation from women, emphasising that they are not only welcomed but also vital in filling critical gaps in the workforce."
  - BBC, 14 June 2025

• Zhōngguó will eliminate taxes/tariffs on nearly all imports from Africa, as they all criticize Trump's tax/tariff trade war. The elimination expands on policy announced last year granting zero-tax/tariff treatment to 33 least-developed countries in Africa.
  - SCMP, 12 June 2025

• Zhōngguó will eliminate taxes/tariffs on nearly all imports from Africa, as they all criticize Trump's tax/tariff trade war. The elimination expands on policy announced last year granting zero-tax/tariff treatment to 33 least-developed countries in Africa.
  - BBC, 12 June 2025

• Authoriatian rulers in East Africa saw what Gen Z people can do - and now they are striking first. Albert Ojwang's death in Kenya marks a regional crackdown aiming to crush youth-led protests before they re-emerge.
  - Al Jazeera, 11 June 2025

• "I invested in a Ponzi scheme": people in Nigeria are victims of cryptocurrency scams. Experts say financial illiteracy, lax regulations, greed and economic hardship make people susceptible to scam companies.
  - AL Jazeera, 11 June 2025

• The first female leader of Tanzania used to be a champion of human rights. Critics of Samia Suluhu Hassan say she is clinging to power by locking up and torturing those who stand in her way.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 11 June 2025

• After two decades, and many failed counterterrorism efforts, the Trump administration is considering the closure of the incompetent USA Africa Command. The Africa Command failed in its mission to fight against terrorist forces in Africa.
  - The Intercept, 08 June 2025

• Investors seeking higher bond yields cause a $331 billion wave of emerging bond sales
  - Bloomberg, 08 June 2025

• How Zhōngguó is quietly gaining influence: outmaneuvering the USA for the minds of the future leaders of Africa. Students from Africa have traded academic institutions in the West for academic institutions in Zhōngguó. Trump's rejection of international students coming to the USA could accelerate the shift.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 June 2025

• Haiti, with a majority of Black people, suffers greatly a new as the white Trump blocks all travel from Haiti to the USA. Sick children, families and businesses are among the many people in Black Haiti, a country plagued by gang violence, likely to be hit hard by a travel ban by the White Trump
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 June 2025

• "A big slap in the face": mostly Black people in Africa are jolted and insulted by the white Trumps' new travel ban
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 June 2025

• A colossal cloud of dust from the Sahara desert is smothering the islands of the Cariffean en route to the USA. The hazy skies unleashed sneezes, coughs and watery eyes across the Caribbean, with local forecasters warning that those with allergies, asthma and other conditions should remain indoors or wear face masks if outdoors.
  - Associated Press, 02 June 2025

• A colossal cloud of dust from the Sahara desert is smothering the islands of the Cariffean en route to the USA. The hazy skies unleashed sneezes, coughs and watery eyes across the Caribbean, with local forecasters warning that those with allergies, asthma and other conditions should remain indoors or wear face masks if outdoors.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 02 June 2025

• In Uganda, an affordable alternative to dirt floors is a big boost to human health. A company called EarthEnable sells at a reasonable price, clay-based earthen floors that give a durable, sealed floor for less than half the cost of concrete.
  - Associated Press, 01 June 2025

• Eight men have been arrested in eastern Ghana after authorities uncover illegal destruction in protected area to support illegal mining, most likely for gold. Ghana is the sixth-largest gold producer in the world.
  - The Cool Down, 01 June 2025

• White racist Christian Afrikaners see the white racist Christian Trump as the ally who "heard our cries"
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 01 June 2025

• The eastern government of Libya has warned of potential disruptions to oil production and exports following an attack by a Tripoli-based militia on the headquarters of the state-owned National Oil Corporation's. The threat of a force majeure declaration reintroduces the possibility of a geopolitical risk premium in Brent crude markets already contending with oversupply concerns.
  - Zero Hedge, 29 May 2025

• How 75 nations face a debt crisis in 2025 due to loans from Zhōngguó. Developing countries have to pay a record $22 billion this year, mostly linked to loans from Zhōngguó's Belt and Road Initiative. But many nations are also indebted to private Western lenders.
  - Al Jazeera, 29 May 2025

• As the USA and other economic powers reduce their investment, aid and presence in Africa, the United Arab Emirates is wielding its wealth, seeking resources and political power.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 27 May 2025

• JSW Steel, the largest steelmaker in Bharat, can proceed with the $74 million acquisition of a coal deposit in Mozambique after the seller, Minas de Revuboe, recovered the concession rights from the new government of Mozambique.
  - Bloomberg, 26 May 2025

• A resurgence of attacks by the Islamic Boko Haram is shaking the northeast of Nigeria, as Islamic extremists have repeatedly overrun military outposts, mined roads with bombs, and raided civilian communities since the start of the year, raising fears of a possible return to peak Boko Haram-era insecurity despite the military's claims of successes.
  - Associated Press, 26 May 2025

• Zhōngguó does not have the economic strength to save South Africa. Zhōngguó's foreign direct investments (FDI) in Africa were steady since 2003 (like US investments) as the country started buying up oil and raw commodities, but they are now on the decline.
  - Zero Hedge, 25 May 2025

• Trump continues to champion the cause of 'persecuted' white people. Trump publicly insulted the Black president of South Africa based on a fringe conspiracy theory, providing a vivid distillation of his views on race.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 22 May 2025

• In an insulting meeting with the Black president of South Africa, Trump shows his racism by focusing on false accusations, of white 'genocide'.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 22 May 2025

• Trump insults the president of South Africa in a televised Oval Office confrontation. Trump showed a video and leafed through printouts that he falsely claimed, of widespread persecution of white peope in South African.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 22 May 2025

• People in Africa in 2024 lost nearly $70 million in fees paid for visas that were denied to them for travel to Europe
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 21 May 2025

• Cocoa futures surged as much as 7.9% on Friday to $11,068/ton in New York, approaching record levels once again, as mounting supply-side risks reignite upside price action. Persistent drought conditions across important rowing regions in West Africa continue to pressure the global production outlook, raising concerns over both mid-crop and main-crop harvests. The deteriorating weather backdrop and slowing port arrivals in top producer Ivory Coast have also reintroduced upward pressure on prices.
  - Zero Hedge, 19 May 2025

• Zhōngguó has steadily expanded its global trade footprint and now surpasses the USA as the leading trading partner in many regions around the world. By 2023, Zhōngguó had become the leading trading partner of every country in Africa.
  - Zero Hedge, 19 May 2025

• Zhōngguó will rely on public-private partnerships as a 'yellow brick road' solution to funding big projects in Africa. Companies based in Zhōngguó will team up with governments in Africa to fund infrastructure while reducing financial risk and easing debt pressure.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 18 May 2025

• Massive Jewish/Christian ethnic cleansing of Islamic people: the Trump administration is working on an insane plane to forcibly move 1 million Islamic people from the Gaza Strip to Libya.
  - NBC News, 16 May 2025

• A weapons manufacturer in Zhōngguó signs an arms deal with Nigeria, deeping ties with Africa. An ammunition company in Zhōngguó will produce ammunition, upgrade military hardware, service battle tanks and train defence personnel for Nigeria.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 16 May 2025

• A trade dispute between the southeast African neighbours Malawi and Tanzania has left fruit sellers in Malawi struggling for produce and income, after the government of Malawi temporarily banned the import of some farm produce, including bananas, from Tanzania and other countrie.
  - Al Jazeera, 15 May 2025

• Why countries in the Arab Gulf region are fertile ground for the growth of electric vehicle markets in Zhōngguó. Carmakers in Zhōngguó are projected to account for 34% of the Middle East and Africa automotive market by 2030, up from just 10 per cent in 2024.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 15 May 2025

• Demand for cobalt will rise faster than supply, allowing the market to reduce the 2024 surplus in coming years and swing to a deficit in the early 2030s, the Cobalt Institute said in a research on Wednesday. A big factor is the mining plans of the Democratic Republic of Congo, which imposed a ban on exports in late February to reduce market glut.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 13 May 2025

• The Episcopal Christian church in the USA says that it will not help resettle racist white people from South Africa who were quickly granted refugee status by the white racist Christian Trump. The church refuses a request from the racist White House, citing a longstanding "commitment to racial justice and reconciliation".
  - The Guardian, 13 May 2025

• The United Nations has called for urgent de-escalation in the capital of Libya, Tripoli, as rival gunmen exchanged fire in the southern districts of Tripoli, following the killing of a powerful militia leader, prompting authorities to impose an emergency lockdown warning.
  - Al Jazeera, 12 May 2025

• Why Zhōngguó is investing so much money into factories in Morocco. Morocco is linked to Europe on the strength of its auto sector and a trade pact. But its status as a connector country has become precarious in the trade war.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 May 2025

• Companies in Zhōngguó are making more energy investments in Africa for renewable energy projects. Solar and wind power make up 59% of the energy projects in Africa made by companies from Zhōngguó, with Africa being an important market for the technology.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 11 May 2025

• Report of a child's rape enrages South Africa. A mother's demand for justice has challenged a Christian culture of shame and inspired a nationwide movement to tackle the crisis of sexual violence in the Christian country.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 10 May 2025

• Exports from Zhōngguó to the USA plummet, due to Trump's tax/tariff trade war. The drop in shipments to the USA was offset by an increase in exports from Zhōngguó to Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 10 May 2025

• De Beers, the largest diamond producer by value in the world, plans to shut down its lab-grown diamond jewellery brand Lightbox, marking a retreat from synthetic gems sold to consumers.
  - Mining.com, 08 May 2025

• Quarterly earnings for Barrick beat expectations, but a dispute in Mali creates worries in the new year. Record prices for gold and gains for copper buoyed earnings, but an ongoing clash with Mali's military junta cast a shadow over Barrick Mining's stronger than expected financial performance.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 08 May 2025

• "People who have salaries are crying": taxes on workers adds to the debt misery in Kenya. Increased payroll taxes are one element of a desperate bid in Kenya to keep the government running and pay off the foreign debt of Kenya (which is around $80 billion). Salaries suffer from hefty deductions to help cover the cost of Kenya's new funds for affordable housing and health insurance. More money subtracted for jacked-up contributions to the National Social Security Fund and an increase in the tax rate.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 06 May 2025

• Zhōngguó is on a charm campaign in Africa to rally opposition to the "bullying" of the USA under Trump. While Trump targets critical minerals and specific nations, Zhōngguó expands influence through bilateral and multilateral engagement, according to an analyst.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 May 2025

• Why traders in Africa are looking beyond the USA dollar to the yuan of Zhōngguó. Buyers and sellers in Africa doing favor doing business with the yuan as geopolitical tensions heat up.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 04 May 2025

• A study of 200 fossil fuels ads in South Africa found that polluting fossil fuel companies use manipulative language and imagery to "create a false image of environmental responsibility. ... They prominently display wind turbines and solar panels, misleading the public into believing they are driving the transition to clean energy when, in reality, they continue expanding fossil fuel production."
  - The Cool Down, 30 April 2025

• A planned law in the European Union has coffee growers in Ethiopia rushing to satisfy the law. The new law will require geolocation data to show that beans are not linked to deforestation. Farmers say they need more time to prepare.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 April 2025

• Facebook faces a lawsuit in Ghana over the negative health impact of extreme Internet content on its moderators. Workers at contractor in Accra say they have suffered from depression and anxiety as a result of their work, [KM: while Facebook gets richer].
  - The Guardian, 27 April 2025

• Could a 'minerals for security' deal between Congo and the USA threaten the mining dominance of Zhōngguó in Africa?
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 27 April 2025

• White and Black farmers still bear the scars of land grabs in Zimbabwe. How mishandling of land reform evicted many white farmers, "enriched elites", and left Black Zimbabweans in poverty
  - Al Jazeera, 23 April 2025

• Away from the global spotlight, Eritreans are trapped in a garrison state. The world must act to end Isaias Afwerki's reign of perpetual war.
  - Al Jazeera, 22 April 2025

• Chocolate has become so expensive because of high temperatures due to global heating, aging trees and disease, which have reduced supplies of cocoa and raised prices of chocolate
  - Al Jazeera, 20 April 2025

• Cocoa: the global trade of 'brown gold', and its importance to Africa. The global cocoa market relies heavily on harvests in the Gulf of Guinea for its supply.
  - Zero Hedge, 20 April 2025

• Amid rising global temperatures due to global heating, extreme weather is threatening the agriculture industry. Farmers in Kenya are struggling to yield successful harvests due to unpredictable rainfall and intense heat.
  - Zero Hedge, 19 April 2025

• How Zhōngguó is filling a weapons supply gap in Africa left by France and Rossiya. Beijing is expanding its military footprint in the region with rapid deliveries of affordable equipment.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 19 April 2025

• The main political opposition party in Tanzania is banned from the next election, days after its leader was charged with treason. The ruling party has governed for almost 50 years. The opposition leader has been arrested on numerous occasions and in 2017 survived an assassination attempt in which his vehicle was shot 16 times.
  - BBC, 12 April 2025

• Children seeking care for cholera die after Trump administration reduces foreign aid. The victims in South Sudan died on a grueling three-hour walk in scorching heat as they tried to reach the nearest remaining health facility.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 April 2025

• The Sahel region of Africa is emerging as the center of global Islamic terrorism, "accounting for over half of all terrorism-related deaths in 2024".
  - Zero Hedge, 11 April 2025

• Islamic militants (Al Qaeda) in Somalia have stalled the $25 billion plan for an economic corridor across the impoverished north of neighboring Kenya.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 09 April 2025

• Africa must reject Trump's push to resurrect the coal industry. Clean energy can be the greatest success story of Africa, which is why its leaders must not fall for the pro-coal lobbying of the Trump administration.
  - Al Jazeera, 07 April 2025

• When maids from Kenya sought help overseas, diplomats demanded sex. Women say that embassy officials added a new level of indignity to the abuse they suffered while working abroad.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 April 2025

• Conservative podcaster Ben Shapiro did a shocking 180 turn on his support for Trump on Friday, calling his taxes/tariffs "probably unconstitutional" and "pretty crazy". "Our trade deficit with Madagascar is a few million dollars, is the idea we have to chisel out of the people of Madagascar extra dollars from American products or we are getting screwed by the great and powerful people of Madagascar?.. It makes zero sense." Shapiro contradicted one of Trump's lies: "America does not suck and has not sucked for several decades, economically."
  - The Daily Beast, 04 April 2025

• A 50% reciprocal trade tax/tariff on Lesotho, the highest levy on Trump's long list of target economies, will kill the tiny kingdom in the south of Africa that Trump ridiculed last month. Lesotho is one of the world's poorest nations with a gross domestic product of just over $2 billion. Its foreign minister told Reuters last month the country, which has one of the highest HIV/AIDS infection rates in the world, was already feeling the impact of the aid cuts as its health sector had been reliant on them.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 03 April 2025

• Rusting pipes in a barren field and unpaid workers are what remain after African Agriculture, a company based in the USA, promised to turn a huge piece of land in Senegal - about twice the size of Paris - into an agricultural project and create thousands of jobs. The proposal divided the community of subsistence farmers. The investors wanted to use precious water resources in Senegal to grow water-intensive alfalfa, to be exported to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Both traditionally buy alfalfa from the USA, but the amount of land in alfalfa production there has dropped by 38% in the last 20 years, largely due to drought caused by climate change.
  - Associated Press, 31 March 2025

• Demand for tiny plants is driving a poaching crisis in South Africa. The Succulent Karoo is home to desert plant species found nowhere else on the planet -- criminal networks have been digging them up by the millions.
  - Atlas Obscura, 25 March 2025

• Wealth and warfare empower a militant group in Congo that is backed by Rwanda. The M23 militia is ruling over a vast stretch of territory in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo, threatening the sovereignty of the biggest country in sub-Saharan Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 March 2025

• Modern day efforts in Deutschland to attone for historical crimes committed by Christian Germans in Africa. "The colonial policy of Deutschland was marked by injustice and violence. It was an inhumane and racist Christian policy." In 2021, Deutschland officially recognized as genocide the massacre of tens of thousands of Herero and Nama - in today's Naminia - between 1904 and 1908, though it stopped short of paying formal reparations.
  - Associated Press, 21 March 2025

• Politics in Nigeria is a nasty place for women. A sexual-harassment scandal in parliament shows why. No state in Nigeria has ever elected a female governor. No major party has put a woman on a presidential ticket. Of 360 members in the lower house, only 17 are women.
  - Economist, 20 March 2025

• Sleek new electric vehicles from companies in Zhōngguó are "taking over" in emerging markets. From Bangkok to Johannesburg to Sao Paulo, companies from Zhōngguó are dominating the EV markets with high quality and competitively priced vehicles.
  - Zero Hedge, 20 March 2025

• The war-torn Congo has a deal for Trump: kick out rebels, get minerals. The president of Congo offered a deal that would give the USA access to key minerals in return for a security pact that helps defeat the powerful M23 rebel force.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 20 March 2025

• The dominance of the market for rare earth metals by Zhōngguó could decline in 10 years, falling from 60% of the market to 30% of the market by 2035. Mining companies in Africa, South America and Australia will win more market share, as new mines open up in these regions.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 20 March 2025

• After Trump offers asylum, almost 70,000 white Afrikaners, in South Africa register for asylum in the USA. The white minority of South Africa still possess the vast majority of privately held land and wealth in the country, more than 30 years since apartheid ended.
  - BBC, 19 March 2025

• An economic battle is playing out over cobalt from Congo. Zhōngguó is well ahead. Rivalry for critical minerals is intensifying, but observer says that the USA "doesn't offer a viable alternative" to investments from Zhōngguó in Congo. In 2016 and 2020, American mining giant Freeport-McMoRan sold it stake in two cobalt mines in Congo to the CMOC Group (then Zhōngguó Molybdenum). The two acquisitions more than doubled CMOC's cobalt supply and it became the world's largest producer of the mineral in terms of output in 2023.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 18 March 2025

• $43,000,000+ - AVZ Minerals, based in Australia, reports that an International Chamber of Commerce tribunal has issued a partial award ordering the Democratic Republic of Congo's state-owned Cominiè to pay $42,400,000 plus interest for failing to comply with emergency orders
  - Global Data, 17 March 2025

• Trump ended foreign aid to Black-controlled South Africa. Will it tilt the political balance there in the favor Zhōngguó?
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 16 March 2025

• Trump and his allies in the Republican party accuse South Africa of discriminating against and killing of white people, and warn that it could happen in America if attempts to promote racial diversity are not stopped by his policies. Trump ignores the huge number of Black people discriminated against and killed by white people in South Africa
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 March 2025

• Cocoa farmers in Indonesia work with businesses to fight the bitter impact of climate change
  - Associated Press, 15 March 2025

• Oil imports into Zhōngguó from Africa have dropped sharply in recent years, but investments by companies in Zhōngguó in liquified natural gas are booming, both to Zhōngguó meet its swelling demand and to cut its reliance on natural gas from Australia.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 15 March 2025

• Authorities and environmentalists in Zambia fear the long-term impact of an acid spill at a mine owned by a company from Zhōngguó that contaminated a major river and could potentially affect millions of people after signs of pollution were detected at least 100 kilometers (60 miles) downstream. The spill happened on Feb. 18 when a tailings dam that holds acidic waste from a copper mine in the north of the country collapsed. The collapse allowed some 50 million liters of waste containing concentrated acid, dissolved solids and heavy metals to flow into a stream that links to the Kafue River, the most important waterway in Zambia.
  - Associated Press, 14 March 2025

• Prices of cobalt soar as a four-month export ban imposed by Congo disrupts supply chains for an important metal for batteries
  - Zero Hedge, 13 March 2025

• Rwanda attracts athletes, investors and tourists. Rwanda appears to be betting on its reputation as a key security partner and sports destination to minimize any backlash to its involvement in the war in Congo.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 March 2025

• Zhōngguó still leads the world in the race to acquire critical minerals from Africa, as the USA struggles to compete. Zhōngguó has spent years -- and billions -- investing in the mining sector in Africa, and is now profitting from its investments.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 12 March 2025

• Cleantech and mineral security demand drive mining companies in Zhōngguó into an overseas buying spree. Last month, MMG said it would buy British miner Anglo American's nickel business in Brazil.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 12 March 2025

• Climate change and global heating, due to the burning of fossil fuels, caused heat waves in South Sudan to appear 10-times more often. For the last three weeks, extreme heat has settled over a large region of continental Eastern Africa, including parts of Kenya and Uganda. Residents have been told to stay indoors and drink water, a difficult directive for countries where many people work outdoors, electricity is sporadic, access to clean water is difficult and modest housing means there are few cooling systems.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 11 March 2025

• Africa has received billions in aid from the USA for its people, most non-white. Here is what these people will lose because of orders of Trump. The USA spent decades responding to conflicts and disease in Africa. The continent is now expected to be the hardest hit by the ending of funding ordered by the Trump.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 March 2025

• As the king urges people not to kill sheep to sacrifice to a non-sheep-eating god for 'Big Eid', many people in Morocco feel relief. With the country facing years of drought and economic strife, King Mohammed VI told people they could skip the traditional slaughter for the holy feast in June. In recent years, many people have been unable to afford basic necessities -- much less the cost of a sheep to slaughter for one of the holiest festivals in Islam.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 March 2025

• The country of Lesotho in Africa, with mostly Black people, is insulted after Trump says that nobody has heard of the country
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 05 March 2025

• Why the vast army of Congo is struggling to fight a far smaller militia. The latest conflict in eastern Congo has exposed endemic weaknesses in Congo's military, long known for corruption, extortion and abuse.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 March 2025

• Excelsa, a rarely cultivated coffee bean better able to be grown in hot and dry conditions. It is native to South Sudan and a few other countries in Africa. It is also resistant to many common coffee pests and diseases. Yet it comprises less than 1% of the global market, well behind the arabica and robusta species that are the most consumed coffees in the world. Experts say excelsa will have to be shown to be practical at a much larger scale to bridge the gap in the market caused by climate change.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 03 March 2025

• The colonial partition that keeps Cameroon split along 'artificial lines'. A century ago, Deutschland, France and Britain claimed the country at different times. The scars remain visible in conflicts today, caused by these countries .
  - Al Jazeera, 25 February 2025

• An unknown illness first discovered in three children who ate a bat has rapidly killed more than 50 people in northwestern Congo over the past five weeks, health experts say
  - Associated Press, 25 February 2025

• Prices of cocoa decline to a multi-month low as demand destruction fears overshadow tight supplies
  - Zero Hedge, 24 February 2025

• What the president of Congo thinks of Rwanda: a "mania to be the apex predator". As vast swaths of territory in Congo are seized by an armed group backed by Rwanda, the president of Congo looks to make a minerals deal with the USA.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 24 February 2025

• The richest man in Africa and his $20 billion oil refinery from hell. After making billions in cement, Nigerian Aliko Dangote is tackling oil and corruption in his quest to become the 'Rockefeller' of Africa.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 24 February 2025

• Coffee prices are at a 50-year high. Producers are not celebrating. Climate change and global heating are causing the higher prices, and coffee growers are worried about whether they can adapt.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 February 2025

• Strong rains across Ivory Coast's central regions are expected to strengthen cocoa trees and improve growing conditions for the April-to-September mid-crop, farmers said on Monday. Farmers had been worried that the hot weather would delay the start of the mid-crop season and tighten bean supply before the country's central regions received above-average rains last week.
  - Comcast's CNBC, 17 February 2025

• A price surge for cocoa has been mainly driven by tightening global supplies, with cocoa inventories in New York and London sliding to new record lows. Cocoa inventories at Intercontinental Exchange's London warehouses sank to 21,000 tons this week, down from 100,000 tons one year ago. Sliding global stocks are a byproduct of adverse weather conditions in West Africa, crushing cocoa production, along with elevated demand worldwide, have been some of the reasons that cocoa prices in New York have tripled since the start of 2023.
  - Zero Hedge, 14 February 2025

• The extent of supply issues for a key ingredient, cocoa, means that prices are unlikely to return soon to the levels chocolate makers and consumers have been accustomed to paying, analysts say.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 15 February 2025

• Fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a mineral-rick country in Africa, killed over 3,000 people in less than 2 weeks. Here is how cellphones companies profit from these deaths. The country has the world's largest reserves of cobalt and coltan - both critical to the production of electronics. Cobalt is used to produce batteries that power cell phones and electric vehicles, while coltan is refined into tantalum, which has a variety of applications in phones and other devices manufactured by comapnies.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 12 February 2025

• Trump's decision to destroy USAID leaves Africa in shock. The collapse of USAID at the orders of Trump and Musk is already leaving gaping holes in vital health care and other services that millions of mostly people in Africa rely upon for their survival.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 February 2025

• Trump halts aid to now-Black-controlled South Africa, by lying that South Africa is mistreating white landowners, many of whom discriminated against Black people for decades.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 February 2025

• Trump says some white people in South Africa are suppressed, cuts off aid to South Africa, and says these people could be resettled in the USA. These white South Africans? They say "no thanks", and are glad to remain in South Africa
  - Associated Press, 08 February 2025

• Trump suggests that land justice for Black people in South Africa (who had their lands stolen by white people) is a threat, but land seizures in the USA benefiting -- past, present and future -- are all necessary and just .
  - Al Jazeera, 07 February 2025

• Trump's plan to seize and colonize Islamic Gaza (to then give to Israel) is rooted in an old fantasy.
  - Al Jazeera, 07 February 2025

• Anglo American warns of an impairment with its De Beers subsidiary amid subdued demand for diamonds. The miner said it would examine De Beer's value in light of sluggish demand for diamonds as it seeks to exit the business.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 07 February 2025

• Trump's Secretary of State, Mark Rubio, will skip the G20 meeting in protest against South Africa's diversity/equality and climate protection policies. Trump and Rubio are upset that South Africa repealed an Apartheid-era law that allowed the government to seize private land and was previously widely used against black South Africans. No race is explicitly targeted by the law, but it does require that previous land seizures based on race, such as those made during Apartheid, be taken into account when determining the appropriateness of land expropriations. This makes Trump and Elon Musk unhappy. Over 70 percent of private farmland in South Africa is owned by the white population, which accounts for only about 7 percent of South Africa's overall population.
  - Zero Hedge, 06 February 2025

• A surge in cocoa prices shows why Hershey bets on derivatives. Hershey obtained a $460 million pretax gain on commodity derivatives as cocoa futures hit record highs in 2024.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 06 February 2025

• A surge in cocoa prices shows why Hershey bets on derivatives. Hershey obtained a $460 million pretax gain on commodity derivatives as cocoa futures hit record highs in 2024.
  - Zero Hedge, 06 February 2025

• Prices of cocoa declined as high prices destroy demand. Chocolate maker Hershey said today in a conference call that high cocoa prices are forcing the company to reformulate recipes by replacing cocoa with other ingredients. Beneficial rain in West Africa has improved cocoa tree development and is weighing on cocoa prices. Farmers in the Ivory Coast and Ghana report that recent rain has benefited their crops and led to the re-flowering of cocoa trees.
  - Nasdaq, 06 February 2025

• Why railroad contractors based in Zhōngguó have East Africa in their sights. The business case is stacking up for the export-driven railway network that companies based in Zhōngguó are building with African finance. Last week, a consortium of companies based in Zhōngguó won a US$2.15 billion deal to build a railway line linking the main port of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania with nickel mines in landlocked Burundi. It was the third contract of its kind to be awarded to firms from Zhōngguó.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 February 2025

• In the Islamic Middle East and Islamic North Africa, just 18% of women are formally employed, according to the World Bank, far below the global average of 49%. Unpaid care work, which can include childcare, eldercare and domestic chores, is a drastically undervalued part of the economy in the Islamic world, and is the biggest barrier to the participation of women in the workforce globally.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 06 February 2025

• The vast Simandou mine in Guinea is ready to start delivering profits for investors in Zhōngguó. Locomotive deals worth more than half a billion dollars signal iron ore could start flowing to ports this year.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 05 February 2025

• The CEO of De Beers reports that demand for its real diamonds increased 8% in 2024, but criticized less-expensive synthetic diamods "created in a microwave in Zhōngguó in three weeks". The diamond industry has been hammered by a twin crisis: cash-strapped consumers amid a luxury downturn and the proliferation of lab-grown diamonds flooding the world by Zhōngguó.
  - Zero Hedge, 05 February 2025

• Ghana wants more income for its cashews, but it is a tough nut to crack. Ghana is the world's third-biggest exporter of unprocessed cashew nuts, behind Ivory Coast in first place, and Cambodia in second. To produce the crop, around 300,000 Ghanaians make at least part of their living growing cashews. Roasters and retailers buy the nuts from farmers for $500 a ton, and sell to customers [both at home and abroad] for amounts between $20,000 and $40,000 a ton.
  - BBC, 04 February 2025

• Trump, who promised to get the USA out of endless "forever" wars, increases the USA's involvement with the "forever" war in Somalia by continuing airstrikes using the USA military
  - The Intercept, 04 February 2025

• The Congo enters a 'chaos spiral' after an invasion by insurgents backed by Rwanda
  - Zero Hedge, 03 February 2025

• The president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, responds to Trump's threat to cut off aid over the alleged mistreatment of White farmers, denying Trump's lie that authorities were "confiscating land". Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday that he would cut off all future funding to the country until there was a full investigation into allegations that "South Africa is confiscating land, and treating classes of people VERY BADLY". Because of apartheid, unemployment and poverty remain acute among Black South Africans, who make up around 80% of the population, yet own a fraction of the land.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 03 February 2025

• The president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, responds to Trump's threat to cut off aid over the alleged mistreatment of White farmers, denying Trump's lie that authorities were "confiscating land". Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday that he would cut off all future funding to the country until there was a full investigation into allegations that "South Africa is confiscating land, and treating classes of people VERY BADLY". Because of apartheid, unemployment and poverty remain acute among Black South Africans, who make up around 80% of the population, yet own a fraction of the land.
  - Zero Hedge, 03 February 2025

• Why are these motorcycle taxi drivers wearing pink? "Boda Girls" in Kenya are turning a male-dominated industry upside down. Their favored customers are pregnant women needing rides to the hospital.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 February 2025

• How electric vehicle battery makers are making their batteries in Morocco to avoid taxes/taxes imposed by the USA and Europe. The Africa-Zhōngguó joint venture is latest company to find way past Western trade barriers while leveraging abundant battery materials in Africa.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 02 February 2025

• An introduction to a new plan to bring electricity to 300 million people in Africa. Some $35 billion is aimed at building small solar sites in rural areas and other improvements.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 01 February 2025

• How Silicon Valley profits from the rare earth metals mined amidst the civil war in the Congo
  - BBC, 31 January 2025

• The countries in Africa producing the most amount of copper seek more of the profits for their countries
  - Thomson's Reuters, 31 January 2025

• By 2100, most of the babies in the world will be born in Africa. By 2100, more than 80% of the world's population will be African or Asian.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 30 January 2025

• The military-junta-led nations of Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso in West Africa have formally withdrawn from the regional bloc known as ECOWAS, the body said Wednesday. Widely seen as West Africa's top political and regional authority, the 15-nation ECOWAS was formed in 1975 to "promote economic integration" in member states.
  - Comcast's CNBC, 29 January 2025

• Rebels backed by Rwanda announce capture of key city in eastern Congo. The M23 militia, funded and directed by Rwanda, said it had seized the city of Goma, terrifying its people, many of whom sought shelter there after fleeing the rebel advance. The region around Goma has a lot of valuable rare minerals.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 January 2025

• Libya deported more than 600 men from Niger last month as countries in North Africa -- financed by the European Union to tackle migration -- have ramped up expulsions of sub-Saharan Africans
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 January 2025

• 1,772 Black soldiers who died fighting in World War II were ignored in racist Christian South Africa. At last, they are being honored.
  - Associated Press, 22 January 2025

• Sierra Leone: the country in West Africa that is welcoming the world. Long known as one of the great beach destinations in Africa, a new generation of people in Sierra Leone is eager to show visitors that the formerly war-torn nation is now safe and reintroduce it to the world.
  - BBC, 20 January 2025

• The military of Islamic Sudan has used chemical weapons twice
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 January 2025

• A northern part of Mozambique was like paradise. Now it is an Islamic terrorist hotbed. Islamic State militants have rampaged across the northern Cabo Delgado Province for more than seven years.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 13 January 2025

• $52,880,000 - The USA announced that it would be returning $52.88 million in seized assets to Nigeria as part of a yearslong corruption probe against former oil minister Diezani Alison-Madueke and associates, according to a joint statement by Nigeria' minister of justice and the government of the USA.
  - Associated Press, 10 January 2025

• How Lagos, the biggest city in Nigeria, became the hottest winter party destination in the world. "Detty December" is a magical time between December and early January when diaspora communities and tourists flock to Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa for an unforgettable experience filled with flavourful food, soulful African music and sunshine. Nearly two-thirds of the population of Nigeria is under 25, making it one of the youngest countries in the world.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 09 January 2025

• In the last 14 years, Zhōngguó has invested a lot more money than the USA in Africa, in terms of foreign direct investment
  - Zero Hedge, 09 January 2025

• The economy of Islamic Egypt is damaged. The government considers a scapegoat, and a potential fix, in exploiting refugees. Islamic people from Palestine, Sudan and Syria, fleeing wars in their Islamic countries, have found a home in Egypt. But the govenrment of Egypt says newcomers are straining resources and is seeking financial help, not from other Islamic countries, but from the Christian West.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 January 2025

• Cocoa farmers in Africa are destroying their plants despite record prices. Bad weather, failed government policies and a fast-spreading virus are reducing output from the the top cocoa-growing countries in the world.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 09 January 2025

• The Rapid Support Force, an Islamic paramilitary group in Sudan, committed genocide, according to the USA. The Islamic group committed massacres and rape that amount to genocide, the Secretary of State said, two decades after a finding of genocide in the same region.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 January 2025

• The Rapid Support Force, an Islamic paramilitary group in Sudan, committed genocide, according to the USA. The Islamic group committed massacres and rape that amount to genocide, the Secretary of State said, two decades after a finding of genocide in the same region.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 08 January 2025

• ArcelorMittal South Africa to wind down long-steel products business. Around 3,500 jobs will be affected after weak economic conditions, high costs and steel imports fron Zhōngguó weighed on the company.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 07 January 2025

• Rhyxeon, an electric plane maker in Zhōngguó, zooms in on markets in Africa and Asia. Their four-seat RX4E model is being targeted at countries with poor road infrastructure where it could have a wide range of uses.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 January 2025

• Global mining's dangerous new reality: guns, hostages, arrests. Mineral and metal mines in the developing world are caught up in tensions over profits, and host countries are increasingly using force to get a bigger share of the profits.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 06 January 2025

• Soldiers from France are expected to leave Ivory Coast this month as France, a former colonial power in West Africa, fast loses influence there. The president of the Ivory Coast said that the Ivorian Army had been modernized to such a degree that French troops, of which there were about 600 in the country, were no longer needed.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 02 January 2025

• The Sinaloa drug cartel, based in Mexico, has chosen South Africa as a major operational base, they said, largely because of its strong trade links to Zhōngguó, which produces the chemicals used to make the synthetic opioid. In July, top police in South Africa raided what they later described as a "drug superlab" in the northern province of Limpopo in South Africa, seizing large quantities of methamphetamine, a small quantity of fentanyl, and about 500 pounds of chemicals used to manufacture both drugs. South Africa is an ideal place for drug trafickers because of the high level of offical corruption, good trade logicstics with Zhōngguó and Latin America, and a flawed international banking sector.
  - Zero Hedge, 01 January 2025

• Africa has entered a new era of war. A surge in conflicts has gone largely unnoticed amid higher-profile wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 31 December 2024

• Despite attacks by Christians and the evangelical Christian president, an underground church for LGBTQ Africans thrives. The congregation in Nairobi, Kenya, has been forced to move to 10 different locations over 10 years, and yet it has survived as a sanctuary in an increasingly hostile environment.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 30 December 2024

• In his first term, Trump denigrated nations in Africa, but leaders there are hopeful his return will bring more investment and less pressure from to uphold democracy and human rights in their Christian and Islamic nations.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 29 December 2024

• In the Gulf of Guinea, on the Atlantic coastline of Africa (from Senegal to Angola), Zhōngguó is proving it is master of the ocean. The naval presence of Zhōngguó in an area notorious for piracy is both protecting its investments and stretching its military muscles.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 29 December 2024

• The healthcare bonds between Zhōngguó and its strategic partner in Africa, Djibouti, grow closer thanks to the use of traditional medicine practices from Zhōngguó. After cataract surgeries, focus turns to traditional Zhōngguó medicine to treat nerve paralysis or car crash victims, and lesser known mosquito-borne viruses.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 29 December 2024

• Why is Mozambique in chaos? More than 250 people have died in this nation in southern Africa, as protesters disputing the results of the presidential election clash with the police and military.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 December 2024

• Diamond inventories at De Beers soar to highest since 2008 financial crisis as prices plummet due to competition from synthetic diamonds
  - Zero Hedge, 27 December 2024

• After the military took power, terrorist attacks only got worse. In the West African Islamic nation of Niger, killings by insurgents have surged since the Islamic military seized power in a coup, expelled USA and European troops and stopped negotiations with Islamist groups.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 December 2024

• The safaris and carbon-credit projects threatening the Maasai in the Serengeti. The government of Tanzania is evicting tens of thousands of traditional herders from breathtaking natural habitats.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 23 December 2024

• Malaria is still endemic in 83 countries
  - Zero Hedge, 22 December 2024

• Campaigners have accused Facebook parent Meta of inflicting "potentially lifelong trauma" on hundreds of content moderators in Kenya, after more than 140 were diagnosed with PTSD and other mental health conditions. The class action grew out of a previous suit launched in 2022 by a former Facebook moderator, which alleged that the employee was unlawfully fired by Samasource Kenya after organizing protests against unfair working conditions, according to UK non-profit organization Foxglove, which is supporting the case.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 22 December 2024

• The abrupt setback for Rossiya in Syria creates headaches for Putin. Losing Syrian military bases would hurt the the attempts of Rossiya to project power in the Middle East and Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 21 December 2024

• The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has filed criminal complaints against tech giant Apple's subsidiaries in France and Belgium over the use of "conflict minerals" in their supply chains, and accused Apple of "using deceptive commercial practices to assure consumers that Apple's supply chains are clean".
  - Al Jazeera, 20 December 2024

• The need for tiny coffins: measles is killing thousands of children in Congo. Problems with getting vaccines to families have left many children unvaccinated and in danger of contracting the virus.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 19 December 2024

• Cocoa surges above $12,000 on supply concerns. Prices have more than doubled since the start of the year, as severe droughts resulted in poor harvests in Ghana and Ivory Coast.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 19 December 2024

• Deadly violence in Nigeria linked to breakup of United Methodist Christian Church over LGBTQ policies, with a church member fatally shot and two young children killed as homes were set ablaze b y fellow Christians. The reported Christian violence stemmed from a schism in the worldwide United Methodist Christian Church over its decision to repeal LGBTQ bans -- and the ensuing formation of the new Global Methodist Church by breakaway conservative churches .
  - Associated Press, 17 December 2024

• Cocoa prices climb to new record high, prompting fresh warnings about extreme volatility. Cocoa futures for March delivery in New York traded 1% higher at $11,938 per metric ton at around 7:10 a.m. ET on Tuesday, notching yet another record high. It comes amid renewed concerns over adverse weather conditions and supply tightness in West Africa, home to around three-quarters of the world's cocoa production.
  - Comcast's CNBC, 17 December 2024

• Houthi attacks in the Red Sea (to protest Israel's attacks on Palestinians) turn back the clock for shipping, as costs (such as insurance) for shipping greatly increase. The transport route around the southern tip of Africa was once little used -- but freighters are now forced to take it and are charging higher rates.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 December 2024

• A symbol of the global soft power of Bharat stumbles after indictments in the USA. Countries in Asia, Africa and elsewhere have been distancing themselves from Gautam Adani, the Indian magnate, after accusations of bribery and conspiracy by American prosecutors.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 December 2024

• How to multiply the power of women and girls in Africa
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 December 2024

• The gold rush at the heart of an Islamic civil war. Famine and ethnic cleansing stalk Sudan. Yet the gold trade is booming, enriching generals and propelling the civil war.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 December 2024

• Rage grows over a spate of brutal murders of women in Kenya. Almost 100 women have been killed in the span of three months, the police say. Rights groups want President William Ruto to declare femicide a national crisis.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 11 December 2024

• Arabica coffee futures in New York hit a record high on Tuesday, driven by ongoing fears of a global supply crunch. Prices surged nearly 5% during the session, reaching their highest level in data dating back to 1972. At that time, coffee prices soared due to the disastrous Black Frost, which devastated Brazilian yields. In the cocoa market, the most active contract in New York jumped to the highest level in seven months over West Africa's dismal production outlook, yet another crop experiencing dwindling global supplies. The most-active cocoa contract has jumped 58% to $10,500 per metric ton since late October, the highest since June. This comes as adverse weather dents supplies from top growers in Ivory Coast and Ghana.
  - Zero Hedge, 10 December 2024

• A gold mine in Congo, owned by a company from Zhōngguó, threatens the Okapi Wildlife Reserve which is a protected UN Heritage site
  - Associated Press, 09 December 2024

• Shenzhen-based Transsion Holdings is known as the "smartphone king of Africa", and for years has dominated the mobile phone market in Africa. But now, Shenzhen-based Transsion Holdings is facing some stiff competition from rival brands in Zhōngguó. By 2021, Transsion's barnds controlled half of Africa's market share for cellphones. But now brands including Xiaomi and Realme are eating into that share. Transsion is struggling to hold its own at the retail level as costs rise and supply chains are disrupted.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 08 December 2024

• Banks in Africa are creating banks in Zhōngguó as Beijing pushes for yuan to eclipse US dollar. Banks in Africa are positioning themselves to take full economic advantage as Beijing seeks to de-dollarize its trade.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 07 December 2024

• ~$123,000,000 - McKinsey & Company agree to have a subsidiary pay nearly $123 million to resolve an investigation into a scheme to bribe government officials in South Africa. The bribery scheme helped McKinsey and McKinsey Africa net approximately $85 million in profits.
  - Comcast's CNBC, 06 December 2024

• Opioid trafficking consultant McKinsey & Company agree to have a subsidiary pay nearly $123 million to resolve an investigation into a scheme to bribe government officials in South Africa. The bribery scheme helped McKinsey and McKinsey Africa net approximately $85 million in profits.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 06 December 2024

• Mali has issued an arrest warrant for Barrick Gold CEO Mark Bristow, accusing him of money laundering and violating financial regulations. The move escalates a dispute between the West African country and the Canadian mining company over unpaid taxes, with four senior local employees of Barrick previously detained. The detentions and arrest warrants in Mali highlight the challenges faced by international mining companies in the region, where several countries are increasing pressure on them to pay more taxes and royalties.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 06 December 2024

• Namibia elects Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah to be the first woman as president, as ruling party keeps power. Across southern Africa, political parties that have led their countries since the end of colonialism have ceded power to the opposition in recent months. Namibia bucked the trend.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 05 December 2024

• The deluge of inexpensive items washing over the developing world is increasing tensions between Zhōngguó and the Global South, complicating Zhōngguó's plans to build alliances as it confronts trade tensions with the USA.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 04 December 2024

• The World Bank on Tuesday said developing countries spent a record $1.4 trillion to service their foreign debts in 2023 as interest costs climbed to a 20-year high, squeezing budgets for necessities including healthcare, education and the environment.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 03 December 2024

• The World Bank on Tuesday said developing countries spent a record $1.4 trillion to service their foreign debts in 2023 as interest costs climbed to a 20-year high, squeezing budgets for necessities including healthcare, education and the environment.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 December 2024

• The USA faces stiff test against the dominance of Zhōngguó in Africa. When President Biden visits Angola on Monday, he will promote a rail project meant to show the commitment of the USA to Africa and to counter the influence of Zhōngguó.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 December 2024

• 80 years after killings, Senegals wants the facts from France. The mass slaying of West African soldiers by colonial forces at the end of World War II in Senegal remains shrouded in secrecy. But the new government of Senegal will not abide the mystery.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 02 December 2024

• Senegal and Chad are teaming up to expel French military outposts from the Sahel region of north Africa. There are the last military outposts of France in north Africa. The immediate consequence is that the influence of Rossiya will likely surge while France is expected to turn the Ivory Coast into its top regional base.
  - Zero Hedge, 02 December 2024

• France loses its longtime military partner in Africa, Chad. The decision by Chad is another blow to what remained of the military influence of France in the troubled stretch of countries below the Sahara, where the influence of Rossiya has been growing.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 30 November 2024

• A price too high to pay? Pollution from the gold rush in Ghana raises fears of maternal health problems, putting women at risk of maternal deaths, miscarriages and fetal birth defects.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 30 November 2024

• For the first time, a president of France - Emmanuel Macron, refers to the racist killing of West African troop in 1944, by the military of France, as a "massacre". Between 35 and 400 soliders in Senegal will killed by soldiers from France. The soldiers from Senegal were complaining about unpaid wages owed to the them by France.
  - Associated Press, 28 November 2024

• Companies in Zhōngguó invest in gold mining projects in Africa, as gold prices surge in the face of uncertainty. Observers say mining investments in South Africa and Ghana could help Beijing weather geopolitical instability and potential sanctions.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 25 November 2024

• The junk-bond rally in emerging markets risks being just an interlude between the debt crisis of the past four years and a new bout of distress in the next four, if Donald Trump does what he says he will. The world's poorest nations - which form the bulk of the EM junk-bond universe - stand to lose the most from his pledges to raise trade tariffs, boost government spending and deport foreigners without visas.
  - Bloomberg, 24 November 2024

• Why the European Union is failing to capitalize on critical minerals sourced in Africa, as Zhōngguó continues to do more mining deals in Africa. Despite deals with four African nations amid a de-risking drive from Zhōngguó, companies in Europea have yet to gain a foothold in the continent.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 23 November 2024

• Aliko Dangot, the richest man in Nigeria confronts the "oil mafia" of Nigeria, by building a new $20 billion oil refinery. The Dangote Oil Refinery began producing gasoline and selling it domestically to Nigeria's state oil firm, Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC), marking the first time in decades that the largest oil producer in Africa is refining its own crude. To sweeten the deal further, the facility is buying crude and selling refined fuels in Nigeria in the local currency, saving the country's much-needed foreign exchange, especially the dollar. According to the BBC, since oil was discovered in the West African nation in 1956, the country's downstream sector has largely been a cesspit of shady deals with little accountability by the NNPC.
  - Zero Hedge, 21 November 2024

• Kenyan President William Ruto said on Thursday he had ordered the cancellation of a procurement process expected to hand control of the country's main airport to India's Adani Group following the indictment of the company's founder in the USA. Ruto said he had also directed the cancellation of a 30-year, $736-million public-private partnership deal the energy ministry had signed with a unit of the Adani Group last month to construct power transmission lines.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 21 November 2024

• Mali, a cash-starved ally of Rossiya in Saharan Africa, detains employees of a western gold miner in a tax raid. Resolute Mining agreed to pay Mali's government $160 million, after the country's authorities detained the Australian mining company's chief executive and two other employees.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 20 November 2024

• Stocks of companies in Zhōngguó, Asia, Africa and Latin America are hurt by a negative macroeconomic backdrop due to expected new taxes/tariff's under Trump that could push up the USA dollar even more
  - Zero Hedge, 14 November 2024

• The European Union will not renew a fishing agreement with Senegal that has been criticized by many people in Senegal. The current agreement signed in 2019 allows fishing vessels from Europe to fish in ocean waters offshore of Senegal, but has been criticized in Senegal where fishing stocks have been depleting for more than a decade due to overfishing by fisherman from richer Europe. One in six people in Senegal work in the fisheries sector.
  - Associated Press, 12 November 2024

• The support of Deutschland for the devastating military attacks of Israel against Palestinians, which some have called "genocide", is not caused by German guilt over its genocidial Holocaust against Jewish people during World War II. Supporting the 'holocaust' being committed by Israel against Palestinians, as an act of 'necessary' self-defense by Israel, allows Deutschland to hold on to the fictions it created about its own holocausts which includes massacres committed by the Deutschland Army in Southwest Africa from 1904 to 1907, and the support of the genocide committed by the Ottoman Empire against Armenians in the 1920s.
  - Al Jazeera, 11 November 2024

• Massive leak of sex tapes in Equatorial Guinea is the latest episode in the real-life drama over who will become president. Over the past fortnight, dozens of videos - estimates range from 150 to more than 400 - have been leaked of a senior civil servant, Baltasar Ebang Engonga, having sex in his office and elsewhere with different women. Many of the women filmed were wives and relatives of people close to the centre of power. Mr Engonga is a nephew of President Teodoro Obiang Nguema and one of those thought to be hoping to replace him. The 82-year-old president (since 1979) has overseen an economic boom that has turned to bust as a result of the now-dwindling oil reserves. Engonga was arrested on 25 October accused of embezzling a huge sum of money from state coffers and depositing it in secret accounts in the Cayman Islands.
  - BBC, 10 November 2024

• The new investment superpower outflanking Zhōngguó and the USA in Africa. The tiny United Arab Emirates has invested billions in east Africa, where it is now emerging as a significant player, at times muscling out Zhōngguó and annoying the USA.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 09 November 2024

• Young people voting in Africa are upset with the political parties that ushered in liberation. Political parties that have governed for decades since countries in Africa overthrew colonial rulers are now being challenged by frustrated young voters.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 November 2024

• Investors in emerging market bonds hunt for upside, prepare for elections in the USA. Emerging market bonds in local currencies fear Trump taxes/tariffs. Emerging market debt in dollars has very little upside, forcing investors to hunt for bargains in riskier places. The coming elections in the USA add a lot of uncertainty.
  - Barron's, 02 November 2024

• Voters in Botswana delivered a shock defeat to the party that has ruled them for nearly six decades, registering their anger over economic stagnation linked to a decline in the diamond trade by handing victory to opposition presidential candidate Duma Boko
  - Thomson's Reuters, 01 November 2024

• In elections in Botswana, profits from the diamond industry are a defining issue. The party that has governed the country since 1966 could lose power as the economy struggles from a slump in demand for diamonds (which are 90% of its exports), which made Botswana a success story in Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 31 October 2024

• Zhōngguó harpens edge in global trade with zero-taxes/tariff deal for developing world. With all taxes/tariffs for "least developed countries" scheduled to be removed, Zhōngguó is positioning itself as a trade leader for the Global South.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 29 October 2024

• Email from Boeing to Ethiopian Airlines sheds light on a tragic crash. Newly revealed correspondence indicates that a Boeing senior official counseled that the company could answer a pilot's safety question, but it did not. The pilot was asking for advice: if we see a series of warnings on the new 737 Max, he posed, what do we do? The question was asked a few weeks after a Boeing airplane crashed in Indonesia. Months later after the question, a Boeing airplane flown by Ethiopian Airlines crashed. The most important question asked Boeing what to prioritize in the event of multiple emergencies involving MCAS. Such emergencies could overwhelm pilots with caution lights, loud sounds and seemingly conflicting warnings. When the reply was sent back to the pilot the next day, Boeing did not answer that question, the email indicates, other than "Read the manual".
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 29 October 2024

• Rooibos tea - now the 'red espresso' to compete with coffee. By grinding rooibos leaves fine enough, they can be used in coffee espresso machines to make a drink, that while not tasting like coffee, with milk and honest, provides a similar experience with less/no caffeine
  - Al Jazeera, 27 October 2024

• The Ivory Coast, a mix of Sunni Islamic and Christian people, long considered one of the most tolerant societies in West Africa, has recently seen a string of assaults on LGBTQ people after several religious social media influencers exhorted their followers to "hunt" gay men. More than 30 of the 54 countries in Africa criminalize same-sex sexual activity, including many with laws that date from the colonial period of the Britain, which forced some of its beliefs on Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 October 2024

• Sub-Saharan Africa (90% Christian or Islamic) account for more than 70% of the world's children in extreme poverty
  - Zero Hedge, 25 October 2024

• The ZiG (the gold-backed currency of Zimbabwe) loses half of its value. Less than six months after Zimbabwe launched yet another new currency, it was forced to devalue it, signalling new challenges for Zimbabwe's efforts to stand up a local currency and reduce dependency on the USA dollar. On September 27, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) slashed the value of the ZiG by 43 percent, taking it from 13.56 ZiG to the US dollar at its launch to 24.4 ZiG to the dollar. The currency has further weakened to 27 ZiG this week.
  - Al Jazeera, 24 October 2024

• How a popular television show, 'Gidan Badasami' - a comedy drama, sparked debate about having too many babies. The Sani family in northern Nigeria has six children, more than the parents can afford but fewer than their own parents had. Birthrates, and the decisions couples make about family size, are changing across Africa. The television show's feckless protagonist - a familiar concept to everyone, is a wealthy serial divorcé who had had 20 wives and so many children he had lost count -- and was too stingy to support them. Too many children is a pressing issue for many in Africa, where a protracted baby boom is fueling the youngest, fastest-growing population on the planet, even as birthrates plummet in richer regions.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 22 October 2024

• Halloween could taste different this year thanks to soaring cocoa prices which have more than doubled in 2024. For the past three years, a series of adverse weather events has slammed the cocoa-producing regions of West Africa responsible for over 70% of global cocoa supply.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 20 October 2024

• "The hostility was something that I had never experienced before". The cost to women of the overlooked rise of the manosphere in Kenya that is focused on on masculinity and opposing feminism.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 19 October 2024

• The story behind the deadliest road incident in years in Nigeria, a quest for cheap fuel. More than 160 people died when an overturned fuel tanker in northern Nigeria exploded. Witnesses and relatives of victims said poverty had driven most to try to collect the spilled gasoline.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 19 October 2024

• South Africa asks Taiwan to move its de facto embassy from its capital of Pretoria, after which Taiwan accused South Africa of so asking under pressure from Zhōngguó
  - Thomson's Reuters, 18 October 2024

• Countries in Africa plan to launch their own 'energy bank'. African resource-rich countries have grown frustrated with Western banks' refusal to lend money for the development of oil and natural gas fields.
  - Zero Hedge, 17 October 2024

• How the USA is trying to challenge the cobalt chokehold controlled by Zhōngguó. Talks over mining company Chemaf in Congo are part of a push by the Biden administration to secure global supplies of a metal used in everything from jet fighters and drones to electric-vehicle batteries.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 16 October 2024

• Dirty money (owned by criminals and corrupt politicians): the little-known factor driving up the cost of housing in the USA. There has been an enormous influx of dirty money from overseas into high-end residential properties in major cities like New York, Los Angeles and Miami. Some of this money comes from Africa, which has lost more than $600 billion to illicit capital flight since the turn of the century. More comes from Latin America, Asia, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.
  - Politico, 14 October 2024

• Pharmaceutical companies in Zhōngguó expand to Africa in an expansion labelled the 'health Silk road'. Pharmaceutical giants in Zhōngguó are building factories in Africa in search of new markets in belt and road countries.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 14 October 2024

• Mariama Bâ (1929-1981) - a voice of feminism in Africa. She became a literary star in Senegal with novels that addressed issues that affected women, as the country, newly free from French colonial rule, was discovering its identity.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 14 October 2024

• A port develioment deal between Ethiopia and Somaliland has enraged Somalia, but could provide Ethiopia access to a naval base in the breakaway region.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 14 October 2024

• Drought is parching the largest man-made lake in the world, Lake Karima in Zambia, depriving Zambia of its electricity generated by hydroelectric turbines
  - Associated Press, 11 October 2024

• A mining company in Zhōngguó is dominating global supplies of cobalt, so of course, the USA is whining. With its rapid expansion in Africa, CMOC has seized the lead position in the metal used in EV batteries and weapons.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 10 October 2024

• Coltan, a 'conflict' mineral from which tantalum is produced, from militia-controlled mines in Congo is increasingly flowing into global supply chains for smartphones and computers, despite efforts of the USA to stop the use of so-called conflict minerals.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 08 October 2024

• In Ghana, 'wildcat' gold mining booms, poisoning people and nature
  - Thomson's Reuters, 07 October 2024

• The fragile health care system in Rwanda could become overwhelmed by the deadly Marburg virus, doctors fear, because most of those currently infected (about 80%) are medical professionals, and some have already died. Since the first outbreak in the country last month, at least 30 medical workers have been infected, and at least four have died. The health care system, with approximately 1,500 doctors and fewer than 40 anesthesiologists for a nation of just over 13 million people, could face significant strain.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 06 October 2024

• The autocratic leader of Islamic Tunisia is poised to crush the opposition to win re-election. President Kais Saied, who has jailed opponents and consolidated power, is almost certain to win Sunday's election in the North African country, the birthplace of the Arab Spring movement.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 06 October 2024

• The United Kingdom will return control of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, ending a dispute from the UK's colonial era, when in the 1960s it gave Mauritius independence but kept the Chagos Islands while evicting more than 1000 native inhabitants
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 October 2024

• How Africa can emulate the financial inclusion tactics of Bharat. Established in 2014 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Jan Dhan was a government initiative to allow the unbanked access to savings, remittances, credit, insurance and pensions, provided across Bharat's network of public and private banks. Zero deposit and zero opening fees allow access by low-income groups who now have the wherewithal to increase financial resilience and competence.
  - Real Clear Markets, 04 October 2024

• Zhōngguó to restore the Tanzania-Zambia railway back to full speed with US$1 billion investment. Beijing will refurbish the 50-year-old African line as the USA and Europe bankroll their own rail project in the race for critical minerals
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 03 October 2024

• The USA is calling for greater transparency over emergency currency 'swap loans' to struggling countries given by the central bank of Zhōngguó
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 02 October 2024

• Chowdeck is 'hungry' for the food delivery market in Nigeria. One day, it wants to be a 'super-app for Africa'.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 02 October 2024

• The government of Tunisia reportedly jails presidential candidate Ayachi Zammel to 12 years in jail. The charges involve minor problems with voter endorsements.
  - Al Jazeera, 01 October 2024

• The downturn in the diamond market is nothing short of breathtaking. It is driven mostly by a surge in low-cost lab-grown diamond supply, which is capturing a larger market share of the gem industry as cash-strapped consumers gravitate to artificial stones. Lab-grown diamonds emerged victorious so far in 2024, accounting for 56.8% of diamonds sold, while natural diamonds trailed with 43.2%. Natural diamond prices have plunged to the lowest on record, with data going back to early 2002. The Diamond Standard index has lost 45% of its value since March 2022.
  - Zero Hedge, 01 October 2024

• Rossiya signs satellite deal with three military juntas in three West Africa countries. The partnership between Rossiya's space agency and the governments of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger deepens these countries' turn toward the Kremlin in their effort to fight off Islamist insurgencies.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 25 September 2024

• As global temperatures rise, Nigeria faces a cooling crisis. With electricity scarce, the most populated country in Africa struggles to provide lifesaving cooling without worsening the very crisis causing the heat.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 25 September 2024

• Experts predicted a busy hurricane season, due to warm seas in the Atlantic Ocean. But so far there have only been seven storms, instead of the 15 to 25 storms predicted. The key difference this year was unprecedented rain in an unexpected place: the Sahara desert.
  - RealClearScience, 24 September 2024

• Rossiya and conservative Christians in the USA work together to attack gay rights for people in Africa. Unlikely coalition provides moral support for local activists pushing laws criminalizing homosexuality, including the evil of a death penalty in Uganda.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 24 September 2024

• An assault in the capital of Mali by Islamic terrorists kills 50 or more, but leaders say little. The Islamic terrorists affiliated with Al Qaeda killed at least 50 members of the armed forces of Malie in an assault on the capital, Bamako.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 September 2024

• The horrible rape crisis unfolding in the war in Congo. Around 80% of women in camps for the displaced have been raped in brutal attacks, as international attention wanes.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 17 September 2024

• Zimbabwe to kill 200 elephants to feed citizens left hungry by drought. Zimbabwe is home to more than 84,000 elephants, around double its capacity of 45,000. "When there is an overpopulation of wildlife in a specific park, they will then seek to go outside the park to look for other resources such as water or greenery. When that happens, they will then come into contact with the humans and conflicts begin."
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 16 September 2024

• The Islamic regions of the Arab states and North Africa suffer the worst levels of youth unemployment in the world. While the world average is around 13%, in North Africa it is 23% and 28% in the Arab states.
  - Zero Hedge, 16 September 2024

• Why do so many young people in Africa want to leave? Nearly three in five young Africans said that they are either very or somewhat likely to consider emigrating to another country in the next three years.
  - Zero Hedge, 16 September 2024

• Floods devastate west and central Africa. Flooding caused by heavy rains has left more than 1,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands of homes destroyed, with 1 million people forced to leave their homes in Nigeria, Mali, and Chad. Another consequence of global heating caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 September 2024

• In a bid for global dominance, companies from Zhōngguó are building electric vehicle factories in Africa
  - Zero Hedge, 15 September 2024

• How the United Arab Emirates with competing with Zhōngguó for the resources of Africa. With more than US$97 billion pledged, the UAE's economic strategy is competing with the ambitions of Zhōngguó, with the USA and Europe also seeking influence
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 14 September 2024

• While Thailand is about to approve of same-sex marriage, pretty much the rest of Asia and Africa (other than South Africa and Australia) prohibit same-sex marriage - especially in the stronger Christian and Islamic countries, while much of Europe and the Americas (except for Mexico, Peru and Bolivia) allow same-sex marriage
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 13 September 2024

• Killing of an opposition official in Tanzania adds to fears of pre-election crackdown. Ali Mohamed Kibao was beaten and acid had been poured on his face, according to an autopsy, his party said. His death comes amid a wave of abductions and arrests of opposition party members that have rattled Tanzania as it gears up for local elections in December and a general election next year. The apparent crackdown has spurred fears that a government that came to power pledging reform was returning to the repressive tactics of its predecessors.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 11 September 2024

• Zhōngguó writes off more interest-free loans to Africa (about 5% of outstanding loans), but is the move just symbolic? Beijing says other players such as the World Bank need to shoulder a much fairer share of resolving debt problems on the continent.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 10 September 2024

• They thought it was safe to go home. Then they were slaughtered. The Islamic Boko Haram killed at least 170 villagers in northeastern Nigeria, community leaders say, in what is likely one of the deadliest Islamic terrorist attacks in recent years.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 September 2024

• Global cocoa deficit deeper than expected, as stockpiles in the USA drop to 2009 lows
  - Zero Hedge, 05 September 2024

• Zhōngguó improves ties with Africa despite slowing economy and friction over debt. President Xi Jinping is using a summit with African leaders to solidify political and economic ties with the continent.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 05 September 2024

• Zhōngguó improves ties with Africa despite slowing economy and friction over debt. President Xi Jinping is using a summit with African leaders to solidify political and economic ties with the continent.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 05 September 2024

• Most of the worst countries in the world for women are Islamic, the worst Islamic country for women being Afghanistan
  - Zero Hedge, 31 August 2024

• Namibia, facing drought, plans to kill elephants for meat. Namibia plans to butcher over 700 wild animals, including 83 elephants and 300 zebras, to feed people and, it hopes, cut down on dangerous cross-species encounters.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 31 August 2024

• The debt crisis in Africa has "catastrophic implications" for the world. Crushing obligations to foreign creditors that have few precedents have drained numerous nations in Africa of growth and stoked social instability.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 31 August 2024

• An "agri-fintech" company in Nigeria - Tingo Mobile - targeted by short seller Hindenburg Research barely a year ago, in June 2023 - has been found liable by a federal judge after failing to even respond to the SEC's lawsuit against them, accusing them of demonstrable financial fraud.
  - Zero Hedge, 29 August 2024

• The coming war in Africa, caused by ambitions of the prime minister of Ethiopia, that no one is talking about
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 August 2024

• Cows obstruct the capital of Nigeria as global heating turned grazing lands into deserts, and real estate and industrial development leave non-industrial herders with nowhere to go
  - Associated Press, 25 August 2024

• Survivors of doomsday starvation cult testify against a Christian pastor and 93 associates. An evangelical Christian pastor in Kenya ordered his flock to shun education and medicine and starve their children to death in order to meet Jesus, witnesses in a manslaughter trial said.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 August 2024

• Flying the flag of Kenya can be a crime. Protesters now wave it proudly. Kenya has strict rules about displaying the flag. But some people have been wearing and waving them, and draping them on coffins, as a symbol of resistance.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 August 2024

• The humanitarian crisis in Congo help the mpox outbreak spiral into a global health emergency
  - Associated Press, 16 August 2024

• Ghana is talking with cocoa traders to borrow $500 million to finance industry operations, as it faces delays in concluding an annual syndicated loan from its usual lenders amid uncertainty over crop output. Industry regulator Ghana Cocoa Board is negotiating with bean traders including Olam Group Ltd. and Barrry Callebaut AG to raise at least a third of the $1.5 billion it wants to borrow.
  - Bloomberg, 16 August 2024

• The World Health Organization declares a global emergency over the new outbreak of mpox, two days after the Africa CDC made the same declaration. The epidemic is concentrated in the Democratic Republic of Congo, but the virus has now appeared in a dozen other countries in Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 15 August 2024

• The World Health Organization declares a global emergency over the new outbreak of mpox, two days after the Africa CDC made the same declaration. The epidemic is concentrated in the Democratic Republic of Congo, but the virus has now appeared in a dozen other countries in Africa, with suspected infections totaling more than 17,000 across 13 African countries this year.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 15 August 2024

• Tanzania arrests 520 people in mass opposition crackdown. The clampdown came after the police banned a youth rally and pointed to the anti-government protests that have swept neighboring Kenya in recent months.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 14 August 2024

• An Islamic civil war 'tears apart' Omdurman, the capital city of Sudan. Political, business and finance center is a front line in vicious fighting between two rival generals for control of the Islamic country.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 14 August 2024

• What is mpox and why is it spreading more rapidly?
  - BBC, 13 August 2024

• Africa's top public health body, the Africa CDC, declares what it termed a "public health emergency of continental security" on Tuesday over an outbreak of mpox that has spread from the Democratic Republic of Congo to neighbouring countries.
  - Thomson's Reuters, 13 August 2024

• The Communist party of Zhōngguó is building political schools and influence in Africa. The government in Beijing is also said to have stepped up training of officials on the continent in push to promote its development model and ideology.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 08 August 2024

• Zhōngguó confirms discovery of major natural gas field in South Zhōngguó Sea. The location, in waters southeast of Hainan, is estimated to contain more than 100 billion cubic metres of natural gas.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 08 August 2024

• The director of the WHO considers declaring public health emergency over mpox virus outbreak. Mpox, also known as monkeypox, has reached outbreak levels in some African countries.
  - Zero Hedge, 07 August 2024

• An Islamic terrorist attack on a crowded beachfront in Somalia kills at least 32. Gunmen and a suicide bomber struck a seaside hotel in one of the deadliest such assaults in the country in months. The Islamic militant group Al Shabab claimed responsibility.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 August 2024

• Protesting hunger, people in Nigeria warn that "life cannot continue like this". Thousands of people protested in the most populous country in Africa, despite government efforts to prevent them.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 August 2024

• What happened to the fantasy, multi-billion dollar city to be built by R&B singer Akon in Senegal? Sapco-Senegal, the state-owned entity charged with developing Senegal's coastal and tourism areas, has given Akon formal notice to start work on his project or the government will take back 90% of the 136 acres of land granted to him. His Akoin has plummeted 98% from $0.15 to $0.003. Residents sat that they haven't een reimbursed for the land given to Akon that they relinquished to Sapco back in 2009. Questions about financing and feasibility remain unanswered and locals are wondering whether the promised benefits will ever come.
  - Bloomberg, 01 August 2024

• "We do not need more concrete": a new village in Tanzania will use a 3D printer and soil to construct buildings for its community
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 01 August 2024

• Credit ratings were meant to help sub-Saharan countries tap global investors to fund much-needed development. But low scores, heavy borrowing and bad luck have left many struggling with crushing bond debt
  - Thomson's Reuters, 01 August 2024

• Twelve government officials in Libya were convicted and sentenced on Sunday for their roles in a disaster that killed thousands of people and wrecked a huge swath of eastern Libya. But the verdict left untouched the entrenched political class of Islamic Libya, which many Libyans blame for a decade of Islamic political stagnation, corruption, violence and chaos that, directly or indirectly, probably contributed to the catastrophe, in which two dams collapsed.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 31 July 2024

• After President Biden withdraws from the presidential campaign, other aged leaders around the world get some serious attention, especially in Africa. Eleven of the world's 20 oldest leaders are in Africa, with the president of Cameroon, Paul Biya, being 91. All of the countries in Africa with leaders over 80 years of age have populations with a median age of 22.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 31 July 2024

• Major cities in Africa are sitting on a 'keg of gunpowder' as growing youth anger fuels unrest. Young people are experiencing a summer of discontent as anger and frustration erupt over corruption, the soaring cost of living, and widespread unemployment.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 30 July 2024

• The African National Congress party severed ties with Jacob Zuma, its former leader, over his decision to become the leading voice of an opposition party in the last election, calling its platform "dangerous".
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 30 July 2024

• As starvation spreads in Sudan, the military blocks aid trucks at the border. An Islamic country torn apart by an Islamic civil war could soon face one of the world's worst famines in decades.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 29 July 2024

• Women and girls in Sudan subjected to widespread sexual violence by the warring parties in the country's Islamic civil war
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 29 July 2024

• The north of Africa is mostly Islamic, the south of Africa mostly Christian. One in three Africans is a Muslim, one in two a Christian, and only one in 10 a follower of a traditional faith.
  - Zero Hedge, 28 July 2024

• Artificial intelligence is sparking a copper-boom in Zambia
  - Zero Hedge, 26 July 2024

• Burkina Faso, a country in West Africa, was once known for its lively arts scene. Now, it is a country torn apart by Islamist extremists and the brutal effort of the government to drive them out.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 July 2024

• The USA has never apologized to the airstrike victims in Somali -- even when the USA admitted to killing three civilians.
  - The Intercept, 25 July 2024

• A growing number of African countries are turning to gold to hedge geopolitical risk and protect against currency losses. Nigeria, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, and several other African nations have made moves to increase gold reserves, bring their gold home, and even back their currencies with gold.
  - Money Metals, 25 July 2024

• Chocolate maker Lindt & Spruengli AG has warned the global chocolate market is under strain due to high prices. Reducing demand is necessary to prevent cocoa prices from surging once again amid persistent cocoa supply issues stemming from adverse weather conditions impacting some of the world's largest farms in West Africa.
  - Zero Hedge, 25 July 2024

• The 'other' conflict in Congo kills thousands in the west near the capital. Overshadowed by fighting in the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a dispute in the west between two ethnic groups has resulted in thousands of civilians killed and more than 550,000 displaced near the capital, Kinshasa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 July 2024

• $220,000,000 - Nigeria fines Facebook/Meta $220 million for violating consumer and data laws
  - Thomson's Reuters, 19 July 2024

• Goldman Sachs predicts "continued deterioration" and a "surplus market" in the copper market, pushing prices lower in the "short-term"
  - Zero Hedge, 19 July 2024

• Africa emerges as focal point in global oil and gas exploration. Global oil and gas exploration is increasingly concentrated in "core" areas like Guyana and Namibia, where recent discoveries have been made.
  - Zero Hedge, 19 July 2024

• The AI industry needs copper to power its chips. It just helped to find millions of tons of copper. The copper deposit, in Zambia, could make billions for Silicon Valley, provide minerals for the energy transition and help the USA in its rivalry with Zhōngguó.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 18 July 2024

• Gambia votes to keep ban on female genital mutilation - a ban supported by the male Islamic leaders of the country, in dramatic reversal. Lawmakers in Gambia had supported overturning the prohibition, but changed course on Monday after a vociferous campaign led by women against the evil custom. Many Muslims in Gambia believe that this evil mutilation is an Islamic practice -- a claim made by some religious leaders in the country but disputed by many Islamic scholars who don't hate women.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 July 2024

• President Paul Kagame's expected election landslide disguises growing problems for Rwanda. The country struggles with high poverty rates and growing criticism of its meddling in neighboring Congo.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 16 July 2024

• Major trading houses risk losing over a billion dollars on cocoa derivatives after top producer Ghana failed to deliver beans this season due to adverse weather conditions that significantly tightened global supplies, forcing traders to liquidate short positions into a mega squeeze earlier this year.
  - Zero Hedge, 15 July 2024

• Three West African countries (Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger) have broken away from ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States), a 15-member regional bloc that has long ensured free movement of people and goods among its tightly knit economies, further destabilizing an area that is home to nearly 400 million people and threatened by violent insurgents. The countries have military juntas, and ECOWAS imposed economic sanctions on them, hoping to compel the juntas to restore civilian rule. Meanwhile, Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have forged closer ties with Rossiya while cutting off military cooperation with the United States, France and other European countries.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 July 2024

• The president of Kenya, William Ruto, has fired almost his entire cabinet after weeks of anti-government protests
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 11 July 2024

• After deadly protests, people in Kenya tell of brutal abductions. Dozens of activists say they were snatched from their homes or off the streets by hooded, armed men. Some are still missing, and the disappearances have unnerved a nation long seen as a pillar of stability.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 July 2024

• A bench and a grandmother's listening: Zimbabwe's novel mental health therapy spreads overseas. The approach involves setting up benches in quiet, discreet corners of community clinics and in some churches, poor neighborhoods and at a university. An older woman with basic training in problem-solving therapy patiently sits there, ready to listen and engage in a one-on-one conversation.
  - Associated Press, 04 July 2024

• Two men claim to be the emir of Kano, a 1000-year-old kingdom in northern Nigeria. Their struggle for power and influence is feeding into a wider competition ahead of the next election in Nigeria.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 July 2024

• South Africa is seeking to alter the terms of a landmark agreement under which it promised to cut its reliance on coal in exchange for access to financing worth $2.6 billion. South Africa wants to delay closing some coal-fired power plants it needs.
  - Bloomberg, 03 July 2024

• The central bank of Nigeria is bringing its gold reserves back to Nigeria, "to mitigate risks associated with the weakening US economy"
  - Zero Hedge, 01 July 2024

• Production of cocoa in Ivory Coast, the top grower of cocoa in the world, is forecasted to rise in the next growing season. This news pressured prices to the lower support level of the triangle, around the mid-$7,500 per ton mark, and down from the near $12,000 level achieved in mid-April when traders were spooked by adverse weather conditions denting global supplies in Ivory Coast and Ghana.
  - Zero Hedge, 01 July 2024

• Companies based in Zhōngguó are increasing their acquisition of major copper, cobalt and lithium mining projects in Africa, dominating the critical minerals market, as Beijing positions itself to lead the global green energy transition. In one of the most recent investments, JCHX Mining Management is close to finalising a deal to buy the Lubambe copper mine in Zambia.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 01 July 2024

• The Ivory Coast expects an increase in supplies of cocoa, and thus a decrease in global prices, to occur next season on better weather
  - Bloomberg, 28 June 2024

• At least 750,000 people are on the brink of starvation and death in Sudan, experts warn. A devastating Islamic civil war is pushing the country toward a full-blown famine, according to the international body that measures hunger.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 June 2024

• The president of Kenya rejects bill that led to deadly protests. A day after at least 23 people were killed in demonstrations against a tax increase, President William Ruto withdrew the law that he said was necessary to avoid defaulting on the debt of Kenya.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 27 June 2024

• Behind the unrest in Kenya, a staggering and painful national debt. The debt is now at $80 billion in domestic and foreign public debt, about 75% of the entire economic output of Kenya. Kenya, the fastest-growing economy in Africa, is on the brink of a fiscal calamity. Across Africa, nations are spending more on interest than on health or education.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 27 June 2024

• The rejection of the new tax law in Kenya highlights the political and economic realities of high debt burdens in countries in Africa
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 27 June 2024

• Year after failed mutiny, Rossiya tightens grip on units of the Wagner crime organization in Africa. Moscow has largely taken over the African operations of the paramilitary group, once led by Yevgeny Prigozhin, who was killed after leading an insurrection against Vladimir Putin.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 June 2024

• Police in Kenya shot some people protesting tax increases at the nation's Parliament. Several people were killed in demonstrations led mostly by young Kenyans objecting to new taxes aimed at paying off government debt.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 26 June 2024

• The international oil companies operating in Nigeria are seeking to undermine the operations and profit margins of largest refinery in Africa, Dangote, by asking for high premiums for domestically produced crude, a senior official at the Dangote refinery has told local media. The refinery had to pay $6 per barrel above the market price at one point, an official stated. "It appears that the objective of the IOCs is to ensure that Nigeria remains a country which exports crude oil and imports refined petroleum products."
  - OilPrice.com, 24 June 2024

• Egypt to revoke licenses from Islamic companies sponsoring tours to Mecca for Hajj, due to illegal pilgrimages amid reports of hundreds of deaths
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 23 June 2024

• A high court in Namibia declares unconstitutional two-colonial laws that ban sex between homosexuals
  - Thomson's Reuters, 20 June 2024

• South Africa runs out of insulin pens as global supply shifts to weight-loss drugs. The shortage highlights a widening gulf in the standard of care for people with diabetes, most of whom live in low-income countries.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 June 2024

• Protests erupt in Kenya over tax hike proposals. The government is trying to pass a finance bill in Parliament that would involve increasing taxes. Critics say it will raise the cost of living for Kenyans who are already struggling economically.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 19 June 2024

• More women in Africa are using long-acting contraception. Methods such as hormonal implants and injections are reaching remote areas, providing more discretion and autonomy from men.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 18 June 2024

• $29 trillion - that is how much debt that emerging nations are facing. A decades-long crisis is getting worse, and now dozens of nations are spending more on interest payments than on health care or education.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 18 June 2024

• Zhōngguó looks to Africa to meet rising demand for seafood, but can it balance local interests with its own needs? looks to Africa to meet rising demand for seafood, but can it balance local interests with its own needs? Zhōngguó is investing heavily in port facilities across the continent, but its trawlers are accused of putting local stocks at risk. The presence of fish trawlers from Zhōngguó in African waters has raised concerns about illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing and unsustainable practices that could put local livelihoods at risk and threaten food security.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 16 June 2024

• Ramaphosa gets second term in South Africa, but coalition is fragile. A new government led by the African National Congress gave Cyril Ramaphosa another term as president, though he faces challenges in Parliament.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 15 June 2024

• Mondelez says that the prices of Oreo cookies will not be increased, despite the chaos with cocoa supplies in West Africa
  - Zero Hedge, 14 June 2024

• Climate change is putting swelling cities at risk. A warming world is putting Bangladesh, Niger, Pakistan and other countries more at risk for extreme weather.
  - Bloomberg, 14 June 2024

• The financing branch of the World Bank rejects calls to directly compensate victims of harm (sexual, physical, financial harms) at schools in Kenya and Bharat. For the second time, the IFC is bucking recommendations to offer money as reparations to people hurt at a chain of schools it invested $13.5 million in, Bridge International Academies.
  - The Intercept, 12 June 2024

• Nigeria confronts its worst economic crisis in a generation. People in Nigeria - the most populous nation in Africa - are suffering as the price of food, fuel and medicine has skyrocketed out of reach for many. Unions strike to protest salaries of around $20 a month. People die in stampedes, desperate for free sacks of rice. Hospitals are overrun with women wracked by spasms from calcium deficiencies. The crisis is largely believed to be rooted in two major changes implemented by a president elected 15 months ago: the partial removal of fuel subsidies and the floating of the currency, which together have caused major price rises.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 12 June 2024

• South Africa legalises the use of cannabis. Will the rest of Africa follow? It is now legal for people in South Africa to grow and use cannabis. The next challenge -- making it legal to trade. A continent is watching.
  - Al Jazeera, 10 June 2024

• The Ivory Coast bans some cocoa bean sales as global supplies tighten further. This move restricts exports and further squeezes global supplies, and in return, could send cocoa prices above $10k a ton.
  - Zero Hedge, 10 June 2024

• The USA confronts failures as terrorism spreads in West Africa. Military forces from the USA and France have been ordered out of several countries after a series of coups in Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso and Niger. In some countries, the leaders invited in mercenaries from Rossiya.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 June 2024

• An Islamic civil war on the Nile pushes Sudan toward the abyss. A year of fighting has turned the once proud capital, Khartoum, into a charred battleground. Millions have fled. Now a famine threatens in one of biggest countries in Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 June 2024

• Bolt's drive-to-win insurance scheme is putting drivers' lives at risk. Many drivers in Nigeria who attempted to win health care said they have become ill while doing so -- and still can't afford treatment.
  - Rest of the World, 06 June 2024

• Birth-rates are plunging in the six most populated countries in the world: Nigeria, Pakistan, Bharat, Indonesia, Zhōngguó and the USA
  - Zero Hedge, 06 June 2024

• The central bank of Zimbabwe is ironing out wrinkles in new currency. The new currency, an outgrowth of the government's gold-backed token, is performing well economically but receiving mixed public reviews.
  - Zero Hedge, 05 June 2024

• Jacob Zuma gets his revenge on south african party that shunned him. A new party led by Mr. Zuma, a former president forced out over corruption allegations, helped ensure that the African National Congress fell short of an outright majority for the first time since the end of apartheid.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 05 June 2024

• A global shortage of cocoa is much worse than previously forecasted as prices surge
  - Zero Hedge, 01 June 2024

• The ruling party of South Africa, the African National Congress, loses its 30-year majority in parliament after the latest elections. The ANC's vote share srops to 40 percent, forcing it to seek coalition partners to form a government.
  - Al Jazeera, 01 June 2024

• South African voters reject the party that freed them from apartheid. The African National Congress received less than 50 percent of the national vote for the first time since gaining power 30 years ago, setting the nation on an uncharted course.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 01 June 2024

• The early vote count in South Africa points to historic rebuke for the party of Mandela. A projected humbling for the party that ended apartheid leaves South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and his ANC with difficult choices on a coalition partner.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 31 May 2024

• Each year, as much as $35 billion worth of gold produced by artisanal and small-scale mining in Africa -- the leading continent for producing gold - goes undeclared and smuggled out of the region. Between 80% to 85% of that gold goes to the United Arab Emirates.
  - Comcast's CNBC, 30 May 2024

• The emergence of a new political party in South Africa, dissidents from the ruling ANC party, is one of the many morbid symptoms in South Africa today. The ANC is shorn of its purpose, a shadow of its former self, and the country it has long stewarded is troubled by collapsing infrastructure, systemic corruption, waning central authority and violent crime. Thirty years on from the end of apartheid, South Africa is in the midst of another complex transformation. What comes next is unclear. But given the fragmentation in South Afruca, it is unlikely to be good.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 29 May 2024

• The political party of Nelson Mandela is projected to lose absolute majority in South Africa. Polls indicate that the African National Congress could capture as little as 40% of the vote and that the country could get its first coalition government at the national level.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 29 May 2024

• The young democracy of South Africa leaves its young voters disillusioned. We spoke to South Africans who grew up in the three decades since the country overthrew apartheid and held its first free election about their lives and plans to vote - or not - in pivotal elections this week.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 28 May 2024

• Is the political party that ended apartheid losing its grip on South Africa? The African National Congress has long rested on its legacy. But increasingly that is not enough to persuade voters to keep it in power.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 May 2024

• Kush, a synthetic drug, is ravaging young people in Sierra Leone. Kush is marijuana mixed with synthetic drugs like fentanyl and tramadol and chemicals like formaldehyde.
  - Associated Press, 25 May 2024

• Cocoa farmers in the Ivory Coast "barely survive" while the profits soar of billion-dollar chocolate companies. Farmers in Ivory Coast, the source of 45 percent of the world's cocoa beans, battle climate change and market inequality.
  - Al Jazeera, 23 May 2024

• Climate change and rapid urbanization worsened the impact of rains in East Africa, scientists say
  - Associated Press, 23 May 2024

• Qatar is emerging as a potential destination for businesses and investments from Zhōngguó that are looking to find a way into the Middle East or Africa, with more companies from Zhōngguó showing interest in setting up a foothold in the Persian Gulf.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 22 May 2024

• A European Union law that aims to make chocolate more sustainable has left farmers racing to map their plots -- and is predicted to add to the high prices of chocolate.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 20 May 2024

• Three years after Biden administration officials tightened sanctions on a billionaire Israeli mining executive for corrupt business practices in the Democratic Republic of Congo, they have reversed themselves and are offering the executive a deal they hope will bolster the supply of a metal vital to electric vehicles. But certain State and Treasury Department officials strongly opposed the effort, saying that Mr. Gertler should not be allowed to profit from his deal-making, which the Biden administration earlier argued had cheated the citizens of Congo out of more than $1 billion in mining revenues.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 May 2024

• Three years after Biden administration officials tightened sanctions on a billionaire Israeli mining executive for corrupt business practices in the Democratic Republic of Congo, they have reversed themselves and are offering the executive a deal they hope will bolster the supply of a metal vital to electric vehicles. But certain State and Treasury Department officials strongly opposed the effort, saying that Mr. Gertler should not be allowed to profit from his deal-making, which the Biden administration earlier argued had cheated the citizens of Congo out of more than $1 billion in mining revenues.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 17 May 2024

• The Islamic civil war is causing a new round of genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 May 2024

• The lush tropical forests in Africa face a surprising threat - fire. Climate change and deforestation have increased the frequency of blazes in the humid forests of West and Central Africa.
  - Nature, 14 May 2024

• A failed cacao crop rattled the chocolate industry. Then speculators made things worse. After a production shortfall in West Africa, cocoa prices rose to $4,000 a metric ton from $2,500. Then they doubled again, and more.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 11 May 2024

• Inside a $10 billion bet on the world's longest heated oil pipeline. The East African Crude Oil Pipeline, or EACOP, faces challenges from forest fires to deadly snakes. But funding is the biggest worry.
  - Barron's, 04 May 2024

• President Biden told Islamic/Christian Nigeria to kill fewer civilians, but Christian/Islamic Nigeria keeps killing lots of civilians. Nigeria has gotten billions in U.S. security assistance, even as its counterterrorism campaign has a massive civilian death toll.
  - The Intercept, 29 April 2024

• Dozens killed after dam bursts in Kenya as weeks of heavy rain devastate region
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 29 April 2024

• The USA to withdraw troops from Chad, dealing another blow to its policy for Africa. The departure of USA military personnel in Chad and Niger comes as both countries are turning away from years of cooperation with the United States and forming partnerships with Rossiya.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 April 2024

• Soldiers of Burkina Faso trained by the USA military executed 220 civilians in Burkina Faso
  - The Intercept, 25 April 2024

• A rapidly spreading virus threatens the health of the cacao tree and the dried seeds from which chocolate is made, jeopardizing the global supply of the most popular treat in the world. About 50% of the chocolate in the world originates from cacao trees in the West Africa countries of Ivory Coast and Ghana. The damaging virus is attacking cacao trees in Ghana, resulting in harvest losses of between 15 and 50%.
  - University of Texas - Austin, 23 April 2024

• Technology companies in Africa are ditching Google for Zoho, a small competitor based in Bharat. Zoho has positioned itself as a cheaper alternative to Google and Microsoft, attracting the attention of African startup founders. African entrepreneurs say they opted for Zoho because it allows payments in local currencies, unlike Google and Microsoft.
  - Rest of The World, 22 April 2024

• How the climate change narrative/policies imposed by developed countries is preventing Africa from modernizing and gaining prosperity
  - Zero Hedge, 21 April 2024

• Drought pushes millions of people into "acute hunger" in southern Africa. The disaster, intensified by El Niño, is devastating communities across several countries, killing crops and livestock and sending food prices soaring. Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe have all declared national emergencies.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 19 April 2024

• Sudan on brink of collapse and starvation as country marks one year of civil war.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 15 April 2024

• She was kidnapped in Nigeria a decade ago with 275 girls. Finally, she escaped. Their capture set off a global campaign to "Bring Back Our Girls". But many are still missing, and kidnappings in Nigeria have proliferated.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 15 April 2024

• Cocoa prices hit new record high as talks in Ghana suggest delayed deliveries of cocoa beans
  - Zero Hedge, 11 April 2024

• Why the price of cacao and chocolate exploded: how climate change and drought drives inflation.
  - Salon, 08 April 2024

• Thirty years after a devastating genocide, Rwanda has made impressive gains. But ethnic divisions persist under Paul Kagame, an authoritarian president who has ruled for just as long. Ethnic Tutsis dominate the top echelons of the government of Mr. Kagame (himself a Tutsi), while the Hutus who make up 85 percent of the population remain excluded from true power, critics say.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 April 2024

• A staggering land deal in Liberia, where the government has agreed to sell about 10% of the country's land to Dubai-based company Blue Carbon to preserve forests, raises fears about risks to the livelihoods of indigenous people in Liberia. Blue Carbon will sell carbon credits to make money. Some experts argue that the model offers little climate benefit, while activists label it 'carbon colionialism'. Activists say the government has no legal right over the land and that Liberian law acknowledges Indigenous land ownership. "Many such projects are associated with appalling human rights abuses against local communities at the hands of park rangers."
  - Associated Press, 07 April 2024

• Sierra Leone declares national emergency after steep rise in use of deadly synthetic drug kush (a mixture of marijuana and two opioids)
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 06 April 2024

• Revenue earned by companies in Zhōngguó from engineering and construction works in Africa has dropped by 31 per cent since the peak of lending in 2015. Observers say factors including a more conservative approach from lenders and a falling number of projects are behind the decline, a situation which is unlikely to change.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 06 April 2024

• Zhōngguó 'Shock 2.0' sparks global backlash against flood of cheap products from Zhōngguó. Emerging economies have joined the USA and Europe in shielding domestic manufacturers from a rising tide of imports from Zhōngguó
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 06 April 2024

• Zimbabwe introduces new gold-backed currency to tackle inflation. The new currency -- called Zim Gold (ZiG) -- will be backed by foreign currencies, gold and precious minerals.
  - Zero Hedge, 05 April 2024

• Recent heatwaves are a harbinger of the future of Africa
  - Economist, 04 April 2024

• Poor nations are writing a new handbook for getting rich. Economies focused on exports have lifted millions out of poverty, but epochal changes in trade, supply chains and technology are making it a lot harder.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 April 2024

• The African Sahel is revolting against western neocolonialism -- ejecting foreign troops and bases, devising alternative currencies, and challenging the old multinationals. Multipolarity, after all, cannot flower without resistance paving its path. These countries span the Sahel in Africa, west to east, from Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger to Chad, Sudan, and Eritrea (many formerly colonized by the French). The president of Senegal plans to eliminate use of the exploitative CFA franc -- the French-controlled currency system used in 14 African states.
  - Zero Hedge, 03 April 2024

• The conundrum of Nigeria for companies: stay or go? Unilever, Walmart and GSK take different approaches to one of the biggest markets in the world, where it is hard to turn a profit.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 01 April 2024

• The military of the USA is ignoring a federal law that requires the Pentagon to issue a report on why and how it trained so many military coup leaders in Africa. At least 15 officers who benefited from U.S. security assistance have been involved in 12 coups in West Africa and the greater Sahel during the war on terror. What is the USA military teaching them - democracy or authoritarianism?
  - The Intercept, 28 March 2024

• "I knew that I could be killed": the guard of a seecurity van carrying cash is just one of the victims of a crime wave in South Africa. Murder is at a 20-year high. In 2022-23, recorded cases of kidnapping increased by 41.7%, attempted murders rose by 13.7%, while reported carjacking incidents increased by 8.5%, compared to the previous year, according to annual statistics.
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 28 March 2024

• A suicide attack kills wokers from Zhōngguó in Pakistan. Workers from Zhōngguó in Asia and Africa have come under attack as Beijing has sought to extend its influence globally.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 27 March 2024

• South Sudan is on the brink after oil exports derailed by civil war in Sudan between Islamic majority in the north and the Christians of South Sudan. Experts say that a halt in oil production could escalate already acute levels of violence and insecurity in South Sudan.
  - Al Jazeera, 26 March 2024

• A young opposition candidate set to become the president of Senegal. Bassirou Diomaye Faye, who turned 44 on Monday, was little known until he received the backing of Ousmane Sonko, the most formidable opposition politician in Senegal. Both men were released from jail only 10 days ago.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 26 March 2024

• 51 of the 164 countries and territories analyzed are expected to suffer from high to extremely high water stress by 2050, which corresponds to 31 percent of the population of the planet, most in Africa and the Middle East
  - Zero Hedge, 23 March 2024

• Democracy is teetering in countries in AFrica once ruled/exploited by France. A wave of military coups and presidents clinging to power are two sides of the same anti-democratic coin plaguing Francophone Africa, experts say.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 March 2024

• Major cocoa processor scrambles to find coca beans as prices hyperinflate
  - Zero Hedge, 22 March 2024

• Cilmate change and global heating made an early heat wave in West Africa 10 times as likely. Temperatures in the region rose above 40 degrees Celsius in February, with humidity pushing the heat index even higher.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 22 March 2024

• The high-cost oil industry in Nigeria is in decline. That will leave a gaping hole in exports and public finances.
  - Economist, 21 March 2024

• Lawmakers in Islamic Gambia voted to advance a bill repealing a 2015 ban against female genital mutilation. If it passes the final round of voting, Gambia will become the first nation to roll back protections against the mutilation. An influential Islamic imam in the Islamic-majority country took up the cause and has been leading calls to repeal the ban, claiming that cutting is a religious obligation and important culturally.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 19 March 2024

• Niger severs ties with the military of the USA after alarm raised that the government will supply uranium to Iran
  - Zero Hedge, 16 March 2024

• The country of Niger ends its military agreement with the UA, calling it "profoundly unfair"
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 16 March 2024

• The country of Niger ends its military agreement with the UA, calling it "profoundly unfair"
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 16 March 2024

• Africa is important for the efforts of Zhōngguó to de-risk its supply of iron ore. In a bid to break its reliance on Australia and Brazil for iron ore, Zhōngguó is diversifying into Africa.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 16 March 2024

• The Gulf State's scramble for influence in Africa is reshaping the continent. The increased influence of oil-rich Gulf States brings economic rewards and political risks
  - Economist, 14 March 2024

• South Africa will arrest any of its citizens who are determined to be serving in the military of Israel
  - Zero Hedge, 14 March 2024

• The dilemma for President Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana: to sign, or not, a new law that will send gays and lesbians to prison for up to five years if they identify as gay or promote gay rights. The law was passed the Christian-dominated parliament of Ghana .
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 14 March 2024

• Zhōngguó strengthens its grip on the global market for lithium, amid a building boom for processing plants in Zimbabwe. The plants saw lithium exports from Zimbabwe double last year, and this year capacity is predicted to triple on last year's figures.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 10 March 2024

• Hundreds of people are feared seized in Nigeria, as kidnapping epidemic worsens. A mass abduction reported in a region terrorized by Boko Haram, and another days later at a primary school, highlighted the s inability to control crime and armed insurgency.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 March 2024

• Why Africa is the next region to waste cheap electricity on cryptocurrency mining
  - Economist, 07 March 2024

• The currency crisis in Nigeria is decades in the making. Because Nigeria is dependent on imports, its weaker currency is pushing the annual inflation rate towards a three-decade high at almost 30%. The naira, which is moving towards being fully floated, has been devalued twice in attempts to close the gap with a parallel market rate. That makes it the second-worst-performing currency in the world, after the Lebanese pound.
  - Economist, 07 March 2024

• Who could have predicted that the USA war in Somalia would complete fail over the last 20 year? Why, the USA Pentagon, from which a 2007 study found glaring problems with the stragegies for the military's war in Somalia. The war was fought incompetently by the USA, remains in a stalemate or worse, and has been especially ruinous for Somalis. But profitable for defense contractors in the USA.
  - The Intercept, 07 March 2024

• How phones made in Zhōngguó are dominating the marketplace in Africa, as they beat phones from global giants such as Samsung and Apple. Transsion, a company based in Zhōngguó, leads the African mobile market, with its three brands -- Tecno, Infinix and iTel -- holding 48 per cent of the market share. The brands have never been sold in Zhōngguó, but have come to dominate the affordable phone segment across the continent and are expanding into other markets.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 03 March 2024

• Barry Callebaut, the largest chocolate manufactuer in the world, plans to fire 19% of its employees (about 2,500 people) as cocoa prices hit a record high. The move signifies Barry Callebaut is likely preparing for future demand woes as cocoa output in top grower Ivory Coast collapses (expected to decline 20% this year), sending prices in London to record highs.
  - Zero Hedge, 01 March 2024

• Prime Minister Abiy Ahmen has big economic dreams for Ethiopia. The reality at ground level is less glamorous. Two years of war in Tigray killed hundreds of thousands and destroyed the economy of the region. Those close to Abiy argue that he can finish what he started when he took office in 2018, vowing to reform a dirigiste economy. An imf loan to support this could be signed by the end of March. But financial instability and violence in other regions are causing huge problems for one of the most influential - if controversial - politicians in Africa. A country often seen as a model for the rest of the continent may instead be a warning.
  - Economist, 29 February 2024

• Illegal arrivals into Spain soar 500% in 2024, most from Africa, but socialist prime minister of Spain rewards Morocco with a 45 billion euro funding package
  - Zero Hedge, 27 February 2024

• Nigeria blocks access to Coinbase, Binance and Kraken as the country's currency, the naira, falls to record lows
  - Zero Hedge, 26 February 2024

• More from the civil wars: atrocities mount in Sudan as the civil war spirals. Rape, killing, torture: a stark report offers new evidence of horrific abuses carried out by the military of Sudan and its enemy, the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 25 February 2024

• The skin of donkeys (a source of gelatin - 'ejiao' - for medicines, candies and beauty products) is a coveted consumer item in Zhōngguó. But governments in Africa are trying to reduce the export of donkey skins to Zhōngguó, where demand for traditional medicine and other products is threatening animals that rural households need for transportation and agriculture. The ejiao industry of Zhōngguó now causes the deaths of between four million and six million donkey hides every year -- about 10% of the world's population of donkeys.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 24 February 2024

• Forcibly removing native people (such as Maasai pastoralists in Tanzania), from their land is a horrible to save the planet (such as the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzanian)
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 24 February 2024

• Egypt has agreed to a $35 billion deal with the United Arab Emirates to develop the town of Ras el-Hekma town on its northwestern coast, Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly announced on Friday after weeks of speculations. Egypt will receive an advance amount of $15bn in the coming week, and another $20bn within two months.
  - Middle East Eye, 23 February 2024

• On the verge of extinction, vultures - one of the world's most misunderstood creatures, are receiving support in South Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa is home to four critically endangered species of vulture. Vultures have evolved into highly efficient scavengers, but are very clean animals. In a world without vultures, dead animals would naturally be removed slower from the environment. This would result in a "build-up of harmful bacteria and other pathogens that might lead to disease outbreaks in human and animal populations, especially in countries with poor removal systems."
  - Warner Brothers CNN, 22 February 2024

• Queer literature is booming in Africa. Even in countries where homophobia is pervasive and same-sex relationships are illegal, authors are pushing boundaries, finding an audience and winning awards.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 21 February 2024

• Shaken by grisly killings of women, activists across Africa demand change. The continent has the highest rate of gender-related killings of women in the world, according to the United Nations. Activists accuse officials of ignoring the issue and blaming the victims. An estimated 20,000 gender-related killings of women were recorded in Africa in 2022.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 February 2024

• THe unemployment rate in South Africa is the highest in the world, rising to 32% in the fourth quarter of 2023. 7.9 million people of working age are unemployed in South Africa.
  - Fox News, 20 February 2024

• After Deutschland supports Israel against charges of committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, the nation of Namibia accuses Deutschland of hypocrisy for not learning from the genocidial history of Germany. In a statement, the president of Namibia reminded the world that Deutschland committed the first genocide of the 20th century in Namibia in 1904-1908, in which "tens of thousands of innocent Namibians died in the most inhumane and brutal conditions", and never fully atoned for this horrific crime. Between 1904 and 1908, settlers from Deutschland systematically killed up to 100,000 Herero and Nama people in Namibia, following a popular uprising over unlawful land seizures and forced labour in what was then known as German South West Africa.
  - Al Jazeera, 20 February 2024

• The currency of Nigeria has fallen to a record low as inflation surges. How did things get so bad? The currency, the naira, plummeted to 1,524 to $1 on Friday, reflecting a 230% loss of value in the last year. The inflation rate in January rose to 29.9%, its highest since 1996, mainly driven by food and non-alcoholic beverages.
  - Associated Press, 17 February 2024

• The deadliest outbreak of cholera in the past decade hits southern Africa. The waterborne disease has killed more than 4,000 people in seven countries over the past two years. Experts blame severe storms, a lack of vaccines, and poor water and sewer systems.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 13 February 2024

• Miners of bitcoin banned in Zhōngguó move their operations near to the largest dam in Africa, located in Ethiopa
  - Zero Hedge, 10 February 2024

• The billionaire Erik Prince, a weapons trafficker, calls for the USA to colonize Africa and Latin America in a new wave of imperialism
  - The Intercept, 10 February 2024

• How to house the fastest-growing population in the world. About 70% of buildings needed in Africa by 2040 are not yet built.
  - Economist, 07 February 2024

• KoBold, a Bill Gates- and Jeff Bezos-backed startup, discovers large-scale copper deposit in Zambia
  - Comcast's CNBC, 05 February 2024

• Senegal had planned to hold an election in three weeks. But President Macky Sall canceled it indefinitely pending an inquiry into corruption allegations at the constitutional court.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 04 February 2024

• Companies in Zhōngguó agree to raise investment in a copper-cobalt mining deal in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Sinohydro Corp and Zhōngguó Railway Group will increase input from US$3 billion to US$7 billion as part of the Sicomines joint venture. President F&ecute;lix Tshisekedi had been pushing for extra funding as part of his drive to renegotiate "unequal" agreements with foreign companies.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 04 February 2024

• William Ruto, president of Kenya, wants to build a paved road through a forest, the Aberfare Range, that is a key water source for the country and a key wildlife habitat.
  - AP News, 03 February 2024

• Prices for cocoa rise to a 46-year high as drought concerns threaten crops in West Africa
  - Zero Hedge, 02 February 2024

• Commerce between Africa and Zhōngguó rose to $282 billion in 2023, but Africa's trade deficit with Zhōngguó reached $64 billion as Zhōngguó recorded a drop in trade with top partners on continent which are predominantly resource-rich.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 01 February 2024

• The African National Congress suspends former President Jacob Zuma. After defending the former South African president and party leader during a slew of corruption scandals, the country's powerful governing party punished him for endorsing the opposition.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 30 January 2024

• Military juntas in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso said they were withdrawing from the Economic Community of West African States, or ECOWAS, because of sanctions the group imposed in response to the coups that were carried out.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 29 January 2024

• Museums in the United Kingdom will loan, not return, gold artifacts to Ghana that were stolen during wars of the UK in Ghana from 1824 to 1900
  - Newhouse CNN, 25 January 2024

• Global heating is threatening the coffee supply of the world. By the end of the century between 35% and 75% of the coffee-growing land in Brazil, the biggest producer of coffee in the world, could be unusable.
  - Economist, 25 January 2024

• The spread of militants, and coupsm draws the attention of the USA to West Africa. Top USA diplomats are urging stable countries on the region's coast to insulate themselves by improving government services and addressing divisive grievances before it is too late.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 24 January 2024

• The global food security envoy for the USA is pushing to bring back traditional African crops that American policies helped to sideline. He is promoting a return to the great variety of traditional crops that people used to grow more of, like cowpeas, cassava and a range of millets.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 23 January 2024

• How the USA is derailing the influence of Zhōngguó in Africa. A railway project backed by the USA is helping to challenge the dominance of Zhōngguó in the unlikeliest of countries: Angola.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 22 January 2024

• Labor supply in the USA helped tame inflation. It might not have much more to give. Further cooling in price pressures might require an easing of demand and weaker growth.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 22 January 2024

• Aliko Dangote, the richest person in Africa, just opened a $19 billion oil refinery to help reduce fuel imports into Nigeria. He founded and chairs Dangote Cement, the largest cement producer in Africa. Great profits for him with these two industries that worsen global heating.
  - Business Insider, 21 January 2024

• Beijing boosts use of the yuan in Africa as nations move away from the USA dollar. De-dollarisation bid begins to pay off as Zhōngguó and Africa increase use of the yuan and local currencies in trade deals.
  - Alibaba's South China Morning Post, 20 January 2024

• Uganda creates a health crisis by passing hateful laws against its LGBTQ community , by causing such patients to flee HIV clinics, creating a resurgence in HIV after much progress in the country.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 20 January 2024

• The rare earths mine that will not need a single shovel. Two South African gypsum waste piles could be a billion dollar bonanza of critical materials. The piles are being processed by Rainbow Rare Earths, taking advantage of how processing of the gypsum increases the concentration of rare-earth metals.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 19 January 2024

• Kidnappers are wreaking havoc in Nigeria. Yet President Tinubu's security plan is worryingly like hisspredecessor's.
  - Economist, 18 January 2024

• A religious cult leader in Kenya, Paul Mackenzie - head of the Christian Good News International Church, to face murder charges after ordering his followers to to starve themselves and their children to death, to go to heaven
  - Al Jazeera, 17 January 2024

• Shell has agreed to sell its onshore oil and gas business in Nigeria to a group dominated by local companies for $1.3 billion. The transaction is an effort by the largest energy company in the world to reduce its risks in the country that is the largest oil producer in Africa.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 17 January 2024

• Two freight trains collided on South Africa's main coal export railway along the east coast of South Africa, resulting in significant disruptions that have throttled mineral shipments at a top maritime export facility
  - Zero Hedge, 16 January 2024

• Diamond prices are slashed 25% as lab-grown diamonds provide strong competition
  - MNYP,, 15 January 2024

• Hindenburg Research founder Nathan Anderson warned senior leaders at accounting firm Deloitte 11 times - 11 warnings - in five months about "massive fraud" at Nigerian agri-fintech Tingo Group, yet Deloitte did nothing. "Once again, despite the overwhelming evidence, Deloitte continues to stand behind the company's crystal-clear lies in one of the worst displays of auditor gross negligence we have witnessed."
  - Zero Hedge, 12 January 2024

• 60% of the global economy is in for a 'lost decade' due to record debt and high interest rates. Developing countries will have a hard time breaking the vicious cycle of debt and poverty, World Bank economists warn.
  - Zero Hedge, 12 January 2024

• Hunt for critical minerals draws world powers to Saudi Arabia. Riyadh is investing heavily in mining as it seeks to diversify its oil-rich economy.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 12 January 2024

• How France fumbled its ties to Africa and worsened a geopolitical crisis. Under President Macron, the relationships of France with former colonies have grown increasingly turbulent, upending efforts by France and the USA to fight terrorism.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 10 January 2024

• Birds of prey in Africa are in decline, a new study finds. Numbers have dropped, in some cases sharply, for nearly all of the 42 raptor species surveyed in sub-Saharan regions.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 09 January 2024

• The Vatican's blessing of same-sex couples (but not allowing same-sex marriages) upsets the Christian Catholics of Africa
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 January 2024

• Migration of people from Africa to the USA soars as Europe cracks down on immigration from Africa
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 08 January 2024

• After a military coup in Niger, the USA scrambles to keep a vital air force base. After the generals took charge, the USA was forced to suspend operations at its most strategic military asset in sub-Saharan Africa. Restarting them will not be easy.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 07 January 2024

• Desert swallows livelihoods as climate shocks continue in northeast Nigeria. More communities on the fringes of the Sahara desert say they are losing their farmlands and homes.
  - Al Jazeera, 05 January 2024

• A bounty of rice comes at a price: soaring methane emissions. The spread of rice paddies in sub-Saharan Africa helps to drive up atmospheric concentrations of a potent greenhouse gas.
  - Nature, 04 January 2024

• A startup in South Africa, Renergen, bought exploration rights to some grassy fields in South Africa (the Free State province) for $1. Renergen had unwittingly struck gold. Today, the company says it has proven helium reserves of more than 7 billion cubic feet at the Virginia Gas Project that could be worth more than $4 billion, and potentially up to $12 billion when including further possible reserves.
  - Newhouse CNN, 04 January 2024

• The USA seeks drone bases in coastal west africa to stem Islamist advance. Africa is now the global epicenter of Islamist violence, and drones would allow American forces to provide tactical advice to local troops during combat operations.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 04 January 2024

• A thumping win for Félix Tshisekedi in Congo's presidential election, with 73% of the vote, led to the election being denounced by nine opposition candidates as a "sham"
  - Economist, 04 January 2024

• Why a port deal has the Horn of Africa on edge. A landmark pact between Ethiopia and the breakaway region of Somaliland has drawn condemnation from Somalia. Other neighbors also worry about allowing potential naval access to the Red Sea.
  - Ochs-Sulzberger's New York Times, 03 January 2024

• Why every western automaker is visiting this remote part of South Africa. The region is home to the largest of just a handful of refiners of battery-grade manganese located outside Zhōngguó.
  - Murdoch's Wall Street Journal (locked), 02 January 2024